Calling all Portsmouth people! Portsmouth City Council and their permit parking schemes....

Portsmouth City Council are doing a survey on their residents permit parking schemes. It is important that everybody living in Portsmouth/Southsea has their say. Even if you don’t live in a zone or near one now, the likelihood is that in the near future a zone will gradually creep nearer to you and eventually engulf your street. The current scheme does not work. It was devised by people who have no idea about the needs of residents. Take action now and fill in the survey with your views http://www.portsmouth.gov.uk/ParkingForum/25518.html. The survey is also available in July’s issue of Flagship magazine. 

Below are some of my suggestions as to how PCC can improve their schemes if they were to implement them across the city.

• Make all zones applicable between problem hours, for example 2 hours parking between the hours of 8am-6pm.
• Allow some spaces within the zone (say 10%) to not be covered by the permit scheme. A kind of ‘free-for-all’ area, a compromise to the residents so if they had any guests they feel that there could possibly be a chance of getting a space without having to use a scratch card. 
• Every household within a zone should be issued with 52 daylong scratch cards per year. These can be used for visitors and mean that those who do not have a car will not feel that they have been hard done by.
• Every car should have to pay for a permit. Scrap the first car free and the incremental charges for further permits. Make all permits cost £40 for one year and allow each household to apply for one permit per bedroom. For example a six-bed house can apply for six permits and they will all cost £40 each. 
• Give a concession for disabled, students, elderly and those on benefits. Providing they can show proof of their status they should only have to pay £20 per year (a reduction of 50%).
• Reduce the cost to business holders. Small businesses should be allowed to apply for a permit for £60 per year; large businesses should be double (£120).
• Work vehicles such as work vans can apply for a permit but at a much higher cost (say £360 per year) and the council should work with businesses using these commercial vehicles to provide a safe car park with public transport networks that companies can pay a small charge to store their vehicles in overnight.