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Council reverses gear on scrapping free car parking
THE ‘Borough Partnership’ u-turns on its decision to charge MEAD cars for parking in Paddock Wood and Southborough SCHOOL R OYA L TUNBRIDGE WELLS
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VICTORY Protestors in Southborough have claimed success after the Council’s u-turn over plans to scrap free parking
By Richard Williams
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THE Council’s ‘Borough Partnership’ has scrapped plans to abolish free parking in two Tunbridge Wells towns after 80 per cent of residents opposed the plans. The Lib Dem-led coalition Cabinet, which also consists of Labour and Alliance councillors, had planned to scrap the first free hour of parking at the Council-owned car park in Paddock Wood and the first two hours of free parking in Yew Tree car park in Southborough in favour of a 50 pence per hour charge. But the moved sparked protests and petitions and even led to Tunbridge Wells MP Greg Clark blasting the plans
as ‘damaging’ for the local businesses in the towns. The backlash over the proposals saw the Lib Dem head of finance, Cllr Andrew Hickey, step down and leave the party to become an independent councillor earlier this year.
‘Residents and businesses will be relieved this barmy idea has been dropped’ The Council launched a consultation into its proposal to scrap the free parking last month, which was aimed at plugging a growing deficit in the Town Hall’s
finances that is set to rise to £3.4million a year by 2026. As reported in last week’s Times, 80 per cent of residents who took part in the consultation said they opposed the plan to abolish free parking. At a Cabinet meeting last Thursday (September 22), the Cabinet decided to scrap the plans. While it introduced an increase in fees across other council-run car parks – which will see the first hour rise from around £1.50 an hour to £2 an hour and annual season tickets increasing from £50-80 a year – the Cabinet voted against its own policy of abolishing free parking
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