Car parking scheme rage

RESIDENTS in the Priory Road area of Huntingdon, who are fed up with shoppers and town centre workers parking outside their homes, have reacted angrily to being refused a residents' parking scheme for the area.

Not only will they continue to compete for road space, but they say new double yellow lines planned to protect junctions and driveways will reduce parking even further.

But they are unlikely to be given another chance for a permit scheme for two years.

They claim the consultation exercise for the scheme, which saw only a dozen responses from the 440 households asked for their opinion, was defective. It was set up so they could object to the scheme but not express their support for it.

The scheme, for which the residents have been calling for three years, was abandoned last week by Huntingdonshire's traffic management committee after it heard some residents were upset they would not be guaranteed a parking place outside their homes.

Jackie Nicholls, who lives in Cowper Road, said: "The way we read the posters on the street lights was that, if you objected to the residents' parking going ahead, you were to make your objections known.

"As we are for the residents' parking, we did nothing, which we thought was the correct thing to do.

"Now we are angry at the fact that the council seems to have made the decision without the residents being aware a decision had been made," she added.

"Some of us are not fortunate enough to have driveways to put our cars into. Some do not use their driveways because there is a good chance the drive will be blocked by a car that does not belong to a resident."

Cambridgeshire County Council acknowledged that notices on lamp-posts advertising proposed traffic regulation orders invited only objections.

"But the letters sent to each resident about the proposed scheme asked for comments, not just objections," a spokesman said.

Another resident, Arlene Thurgood, added: "If you drive around the Priory Road area after 6pm, it's obvious how many workers and shoppers use our streets as a free car park. All most residents want to do is park near their homes."

Diane Thompson, who lives in Priory Road, said: "At the present moment every Tom, Dick and Harry is taking advantage of the situation and people are being allowed to park willy-nilly, putting the safety of the public at risk and affecting the quality of the residents' lives. They (the committee) should not be allowed to get away with this."

She said that, only last Friday, an accident involving two vehicles on the corner of Priory Road had resulted from the congestion that was allowed to build up every day.

Councillor Tom Sanderson, who supported the plan in committee and spoke forcefully - but unsuccessfully - against ditching it, said: "The decision not to go ahead was misguided, particularly as it was the county council's own scheme devised several months ago."

There is little chance of the matter being re-opened, at least for the time being. "Unless there is a significant change or a different suggestion comes up, it will not be reconsidered for two years," said the county council spokesman.