Can the Residents' Parking Scheme solve Rickmansworth's parking problem?

Traffic, and parking problems in the town and in residential areas, have blighted Rickmansworth for many years. This situation can only get worse as more houses and flats are built and more cars are introduced onto our roads. The District Council, (TRDC), is implementing its latest proposals to extend the existing residential parking zones, but will these proposals do anything to ease current parking problems or will the proposals merely exacerbate an already difficult situation? Is the Council tackling parking objectively, or just responding to problems as more people take to the car? Should the Council be developing a policy on “traffic issues” in the round, as part of its commitment to prepare the Three Rivers Local Development Framework? The purpose of the Framework is to set out a long-term vision for the District to 2021? The Framework is the subject of a public consultation, so does the Residents’ Association have an obligation to respond to the consultation on behalf of its members? It will be assumed that residents would like the Association to respond to the consultation.
Traffic and parking problems are a big issue. It might be better to highlight the problems arising from each area independently, before drawing conclusions to offer TRDC as the Association’s view or vision to 2021. Therefore, the purpose of this article is to identify the problems and possible solutions that could be included in a vision for the district to 2021.
What are the causes and consequences of Rickmansworth’s parking problems? Residents are likely to agree that progress, legislation, and people's attitude to the car are undermining the town's infrastructure and character, and threatening our quality of life. Progress has increased the numbers of residents, shoppers, and commuters using the town. Riverside Drive, Rectory Road, Park Road, and the Chorleywood Road become choked by through traffic at peak periods. The M25 acts more as a magnet for through traffic than a by-pass. Legislation is leading to haphazard development. Planners, nationally and locally, seem to ignore the fact that many towns were not built to accommodate today's traffic and they overlook the need to develop the local infrastructure in parallel with other developments. Progress and legislation often combine to expose people's less desirable qualities. The car has become a status symbol, as well as a mode of transport. People tend to drive rather than walk. Parents drive their children to school, rather than walk with them or let them use the school bus. Public transport no longer satisfies people's daily travel needs. The parking problems in residential areas are not due to insufficient parking spaces for residents, but rather to the needs of non-residents who come into Rickmansworth, expecting to park to suit their convenience and often to do so at someone else's expense! The solution to our parking problem must be based on reducing the number of non-residents who want to leave their cars parked within the town and residential areas during working hours.

The existing controlled parking zones have been effective in preventing non-residents parking in some residential areas, but new problems have emerged since the zones were introduced. For instance, Meadow Way has become a new carpark, as non-residents have moved into the Cedars Estate to find free parking. Now, cars emerging from Shepherd's Way, and adjacent roads, cannot see approaching traffic as they turn into Meadow Way. The road is made narrower when cars are parked down one side of the road, so it is only a matter of time before there is an accident. Unfortunately, the Council's new proposals are likely to exacerbate this problem as non-residents move elsewhere to find a parking space!
So, why is the Council extending the parking scheme if it is not likely to reduce the parking problem? It is doing so to raise the income necessary to enforce the parking scheme. To have a credible scheme it must be enforced by patrolling wardens. Local Government cannot fund parking schemes through council tax, so parking schemes must be self-financing. Most houses adjacent to the town centre and the station have sufficient off street parking to meet residents' needs, so some residents have not purchased parking permits. They see the £40 permit as a charge to park on or adjacent to their property, not as the source of funding to enforce the scheme. Before the parking zones were introduced, Ebury Road, Townfield, and other areas were free carparks, either because there is insufficient parking spaces in the long-term carparks, or because the non-residents are unwilling to pay to park within the town and its environs. Does the non-resident have a right to free parking? Is it fair to let them do so?

Two of the Council's latest proposals are detrimental to residents. First, the Council intends to replace the free residents' “visitor permits” with new permits that can be purchased and given to visitors, but these are limited to a maximum of 180 visitor permits per household per year. Thus, those who already pay to enforce the controlled parking zones are being invited to pay more to accommodate their visitors. Secondly, the Council will extend the existing Zone D, to provide more residents' permit parking, presumably to attract more income, and waiting restrictions in Meadow Way, Money Hill Road, and parts of the adjacent roads. Half-day residents' parking permits will be required to park in the adjacent roads between 8.30am and 1.30pm. These restrictions may deny non-residents the opportunity to park in the extended Zone D, but will it stop them from parking in areas not previously used for parking. Why has the Council taken this course of action rather than deter the non-residents from parking in residential areas? Will residents be prepared to pay £1 every time their visitors call in a car? Does the Council have the authority to control the number of visitors (in cars) calling on individual households? Will all of the residents who live in the new extended zones buy parking permits to enforce the zone when they too have drives on which to park their cars? Will the proposal bring in sufficient new money to enforce the extended parking zones effectively? If Rickmansworth is providing parking for non-residents, then they too should be made to pay for the facility. If there are insufficient parking spaces to accommodate non-residents can TRDC provide more spaces? If it is not possible to provide more parking spaces, how can non-residents be deterred from parking in residential areas? What means are available to reduce the parking problem?
In bigger towns and cities, parking problems have been reduced by a "park & ride" scheme. While big towns have more land, particularly brown field sites, Rickmansworth has few remaining brown field sites. Those that were available have become housing estates, or flats, bringing in more cars to exacerbate parking and traffic problems. It is understood that the Council has already met its target for new housing development set by the Government in the period to 2012. Does the Council have the authority to prevent more houses being built on sites that become available for development? For example, a site adjacent to the sewage works and the industrial park at Maple Cross has become available for development and would make an ideal site for a "park and ride" facility. If appropriately landscaped the "park and ride" facility would not become an eyesaw or inconvenience for local residents, but it could be the means to reduce the number of non-residents who currently come into the town to park. There are bus routes in the area that could be better utilised to bring the "park & ride" community into the town. Now is perhaps the time for residents to demand that the Council should adopt a "park & ride" policy. It might become necessary to compulsorily purchase some land, or possibly to encroach on the green belt, to implement the policy. This may seem a radical proposal, but it will take a radical solution to restore Rickmansworth to its residents and prevent further deterioration in the area's character and infrastructure.

There may be those who think that a “park and ride” facility would deter non-residents from entering the town, if they were forced to pay for parking. In that case, the investment would be wasted. However, what alternative solutions are available? The Waitrose supermarket, if built, may reduce the number of shoppers that enter the town, but it would not reduce the number of non-residents who park in Rickmansworth and go to work down the Metropolitan Line. Could a section of the station and the Homestead Road carparks be reserved for non-residents who purchase parking permits for those sites?
The foregoing paragraphs deal with non-residents needs to park. It does not consider those residents who live at the top of Upper Hill Rise and Moor Lane who would like to park and shop in the town. They deserve some consideration. Neither does this article deal with traffic congestion, rat races, speeding and a host of other problems that should be considered under “traffic issues in the round”. The Association would therefore welcome residents' views on traffic and parking issues, particularly if they support the proposal that the Association should respond to the public consultation on a vision for the District to 2021. Please help us to help you! We want to be in the business of solving problems from the bottom up, while respecting but challenging, the solutions imposed from the top.

Cliff Le Quelenec

Letter from Mr V C Hind of 38 Highfield Way, to Three Rivers District Council, dated 16th May 2006.
"Ref: Proposed permanent parking restrictions in Highfield Way (HW)
We received a letter and copies of plans from Bond Pearce dated 11th May 2006 on the above subject, and should like the following points / objections to be taken into account.

1). The basic problem is one of displacement "all day" parking. Since the Council started to apply restrictions to parking within the town itself, each new restriction has simply driven the problem somewhere else. Your latest new parking scheme in Meadow Way has now been in force since April, and already has created a major problem in HW which your double lining of the "banjo" corners will in no way solve.
2). As residents at this address for 36 years we can honestly say the parking and driving problems we are now experiencing are entirely new and causing us and our neighbours great concern.
3). The parking scheme in Meadow Way you recently installed to remove the commuter all day parking certainly worked. Since the scheme came into effect I have never seen more than one vehicle parked at any time of day (there were typically twenty). Unfortunately, virtually all the cars that were in Meadow Way have now migrated to HW. Our road is much the busiest of the three roads intersecting Meadow Way, as it is the only through route to Berry Lane. As long as you have long strings of cars parked nose to tail along one side (uphill) of a road as narrow as HW you will have a serious safety hazard. This is caused by cars being unable to pass each other on their way up or down the steep hill and the resulting queues waiting to get past the "bottleneck". Impatience will we fear result in a head on collision sooner or later.
4). The specific action you have apparently already taken to reduce the dangers of parking on the corners of the "banjo" has predictably simply driven or squeezed the problems somewhere else; in this case even further up the hill. So, commuters are now parking all day outside of houses Nos: 35 to 40. This increasing length of nose to tale parking further increases the daylong problems in simply driving up or down the road.
5). Although the double yellow lines do not affect us I should like to complain strongly on behalf of the owners of 33, 36, 12, and 13. They are now suddenly, without warning, no longer able to park outside of their own houses. If we are to have restricted parking on Highfield Way, itself for safety reasons, I can see no reason why the double yellow lines should not stop say one metre round each corner, as there is no through traffic in the residential access roads.
6). I agree with a consultation process and am grateful for a chance to comment. However the double yellow lining of the "banjo" corners that took place on the 8th May appears to be "un fait accompli" not a temporary restriction at all?
I should be grateful for an acknowledgement of this letter, and if there is to be any kind of meeting, to be kept informed of this.
Yours sincerely,
V C Hind."

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