Kemble - station, facilities, improvements, events and incidents - merged posts

[whole diary]

[Sapperton Tunnel]

Let's see if I've understood this.

There's been a parking problem near Kemble Station with people leaving their cars there - legally but a nuisance - for the day.

GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) proposed to build a 333 space car park, but the planning authority (CDC) felt this wouldn't do any good, as people would continue to park in the streets and the new car park would be little used. So the planning authority indicated they were inclined to reject the car park.   So GWR got together with the highway authority (GCC) and arranged that they (GCC) would bring in some restrictions to ensure that people couldn't park in the streets any longer and would have to use the station car park (or, heaven help us, the bus from Cirencester!)

With the arrangement that the highway authority and GWR had put together, the combination looked sensible to the planners, so they passed the car park but with the proviso that it couldn't be used until the street parking restrictions were in place.

Small problem - GCC hasn't (yet) put the parking restrictions in place, so the car park - although built - can'r (yet) be used.   Oops.

Almost there.

GWR proposed to build a 333 space car park due to the demand for rail travel in the locality. Growth at Kemble Station has been stunted in recent years compared to other railway stations in the area and this has been ascribed to lack of car parking capacity. Often, the car park is full and travellers park in the village and two types of 'parkers' have been identified - firstly those who arrive after the car park is full and genuinely have nowhere else to park and secondly those who habitually park in the village, to avoid the car park charges.

After years of pressure, plus realisation from the DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) and the commercial need for GWR to increase passenger numbers and hence revenue, that there was an unfulfilled latent demand at Kemble, more car parking spaces at Kemble was included in the GWR franchise agreement.

The additional car parking provided a route to implementing a residents parking scheme for the village with the intent of removing fly parking in the village by ensuring rail users use the railway car park.   

This was one of the conditions of the planning consent, in the same way that, for instance, the conservation of existing hedgerows, an approved landscape and planting scheme and low level lighting were also conditions.

These conditions were determined by CDC and accepted by GWR. The residents parking scheme is no more or no less of a condition of all the others required in determining whether the application was approved or rejected.
Grahame's sentence beginning "So GWR got together with the highway authority ......" and from then on is accurate

[Sapperton Tunnel]

Why not look at CDC's reason for the condition? In the decision notice, they said:

4 Prior to the occupation/use of the proposed car park, a scheme of on street parking restrictions shall be implemented broadly in accordance with the details contained in Appendix J of the Transport Statement/Assessment.

Reason: To ensure that safe and suitable access through Kemble is maintained as a result of the scheme hereby permitted in accordance with paragraphs 32 and 35 of the National Planning Policy Framework.

This point refers to existing conditions of certain roads in Kemble. Due to the fly parking they are not currently considered safe and providing suitable access through Kemble (especially for emergency services and fire engines in particular). The new car park and residents parking scheme will enable safe and suitable access through Kemble, which would most likely get worse with more patronage at the station and no car parking expansion.


The cost of the residents car parking scheme is rumoured locally to be in the region of £250,000. Kemble Parish Council certainly does not have this sort of money (annual precept £15,000) nor does Cotswold District Council. Stuving is absolutely correct in that the opportunity to implement a residents parking scheme and remove fly parking at someone else's expense (ie GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway)) was used as a bargaining chip.

I heard it direct from the horses mouth that the conversation (to GWR) went along the lines of "No (residents) car parking scheme, which you pay for =  No car park". That's the nub; it was as simple as that and the Planners were required to word it as appropriate. 

[John R]

I'm surprised GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) didn't pull out if that's the case and go and spend the money where locals would be a bit more appreciative of the investment.

[rogerw]

A residents' parking scheme seems to me to be a bit of overkill here. Apart from the costs of setting it up there is the ongoing cost of maintaining it both for the council and the residents who will have to pay for permits.  Perhaps GCC should look at schemes elsewhere where restrictions on parking in the middle of the day have achieved the same result of removing commuter parking and at much lower costs.  I am also still of the view that the condition is not valid in law and thus cannot be enforced.

[ellendune]

I agree with JohnR

The additional parking could not make the fly parking worse! So do the residents parking scheme regardless of the parking not as a condition of it!

I am sorry if I am a bit thick, but I do not understand your sentence.

Apologies for not being clear.

Building a new car park will not make the fly parking any worse.  If the problem is not enough parking it could only make it better.

It is therefore perverse to link the provision of a residents parking scheme as a condition of building the car park.

A planning condition is to mitigate the impact of the development. The fly parking is as a result of the station not the extra car park! In this case, unless the car park can be shown to make the fly parking worse it is ultra vires to include such a planning condition.

If CDC refuse GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway)'s release of the condition and GWR appeal then a planning inspector would find fro GWR. 

If CDC simply wanted GWR to fund the residents parking scheme then this would have to have been done through a S106 agreement to provide the funding, but it could not bind GCC to implement such a scheme.

This is an abuse of the planning system and should be called out as such!

That said I am not unsympathetic with the residents problems. It is just that the solution as proposed does not seem to me (I am not a lawyer) to be a proper use of the planning system.

[Sapperton Tunnel]

I'm surprised GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) didn't pull out if that's the case and go and spend the money where locals would be a bit more appreciative of the investment.

I'm afraid that I find that to be a little arrogant.

How would you like it if your driveway was blocked by a parked car and you couldn't get out all day and missed a hospital appointment?

How would you like it if you had arranged a furniture removal van, put cones out the night before, only to find next day that a fly parker had moved them and parked there, leaving the removal men to hike your furniture and possessions 200 yards down the road in the wet to the van, which also had to keep shuttling to let traffic by?

I could go on and on with lots of examples, but I think you get the jist.

It is not up to GWR alone to decide where the investment goes. The current GWR franchise is an agreement between the DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) and GWR. In that agreement if I recall correctly GWR were to provide 2000 new car parking spaces at a number of stations including Kemble. The pressure to include Kemble on the list came from both GWR for commercial reasons and also from the DfT due to longstanding pressure from the local MP^▸ (Member of Parliament) and others.

My recollection of dates is a bit hazy, but FGW^▸ (First Great Western) as it was then approached the landowner to lease the land in late 2013 or early 2014. It was thought at the time that the land required would be for about a 200 to 250 sized car park.

Initial approaches were made to Cotswold District Council sometime in the middle of 2014 regarding the planning situation and the reaction was mixed - the site would affect the landscape, but on the other hand they understood the strategic importance of it, plus the need to resolve the increasing fly parking in Kemble.

FGW were told at that time that in developing their proposal, a parking scheme for Kemble would need to be included and they should factor this into their calculations.

FGW submitted their first planning application in February 2015 for 333 spaces. This was somewhat of a surprise, compared to the expected 200 - 250 number, but FGW explained that their calculation of the latent demand due to lack of parking, plus the existing growth, plus additional growth from an IEP^▸ (Intercity Express Program / Project.) hourly service to and from London would indicate the new car park would be full in the 10 - 30 year horizon. This was formalised in a later planning document.

It was also thought that FGW were struggling a bit to create the 2000 new spaces, so bumping up the number at Kemble a bit at a cheaper cost than in urban areas would help.

The locals are appreciative of the investment, but as I have previously said the new car park and the residents parking scheme are intrinsically linked and FGWR have understood that from day 1. They have also lost a nice landscape. There is no difference between this situation and wishing to build a new industrial estate and being required to build the new roads that serve it.

In summary, GWR want to increase their business at Kemble by building a new car park. Providing a residents parking scheme is part of that solution.

[Sapperton Tunnel]

I agree with JohnR

The additional parking could not make the fly parking worse! So do the residents parking scheme regardless of the parking not as a condition of it!

I am sorry if I am a bit thick, but I do not understand your sentence.

Apologies for not being clear.

Building a new car park will not make the fly parking any worse.  If the problem is not enough parking it could only make it better.

It is therefore perverse to link the provision of a residents parking scheme as a condition of building the car park.

A planning condition is to mitigate the impact of the development. The fly parking is as a result of the station not the extra car park! In this case, unless the car park can be shown to make the fly parking worse it is ultra vires to include such a planning condition.

If CDC refuse GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway)'s release of the condition and GWR appeal then a planning inspector would find fro GWR. 

If CDC simply wanted GWR to fund the residents parking scheme then this would have to have been done through a S106 agreement to provide the funding, but it could not bind GCC to implement such a scheme.

This is an abuse of the planning system and should be called out as such!

That said I am not unsympathetic with the residents problems. It is just that the solution as proposed does not seem to me (I am not a lawyer) to be a proper use of the planning system.

Thank you so much for making things simple for me to understand.

Firstly, there are two types of fly parkers. There are those who arrive later and genuinely cannot find a space in the car park because it is full. There are also those who fly park because they do not want to pay for their parking for whatever reason. It is these parkers in particular that cause a nuisance and both the village and GWR in good neighbour mode want to see use the new car park and GWR collect the car park fee as well.

The fly parking has been going on since the late 1980's and the car park has been expanded several times. We now have a large enough expansion where at long last a residents parking scheme is affordable within the business case for the car park. The new car park could become full in anywhere from 10 to 30 years time and without a parking scheme we could be back to square one, fly parking wise, relatively soon. The long view is being taken.

I am actually rather fond of GWR and think on the whole they do a good job. However, suppose they loose the franchise and a new company takes over who raises the car parking fees to £10 or £12 per day levels. There would be double parked fly parking then and Kemble will have one of the best skateboarding venues in the South West.   

With regards to the legality of the residents parking scheme, I am told it is entirely legal. There are numerous instances where local authorities in urban areas have created car parks and then painted double yellow lines to stop on-street parking and introduced residents parking schemes. It is entirely legal to intrinsically link the provision of a residents parking scheme to that of providing a new car park.The parking scheme is of equal rank to that of proving a new car park, not a mitigation so a Section 106 is not required.

 

[John R]

I have a lot of sympathy for the parking problems faced by the residents of Kemble. However, the conditions imposed by the council to link planning permission with a parking scheme appear unreasonable when, prima facie, the car park can only improve the situation. Surely it's for the local council to sort out the parking issues, with or without an enlarged car park?

As an aside, my local station desperately needed an expanded station car  park a couple  years ago. In that instance the council put its money where its mouth is, dipped into its pocket and paid for it, and as far as I can tell, it has solved the problems of fly parking locally.

[Sapperton Tunnel]

A residents' parking scheme seems to me to be a bit of overkill here. Apart from the costs of setting it up there is the ongoing cost of maintaining it both for the council and the residents who will have to pay for permits.  Perhaps GCC should look at schemes elsewhere where restrictions on parking in the middle of the day have achieved the same result of removing commuter parking and at much lower costs.  I am also still of the view that the condition is not valid in law and thus cannot be enforced.

The emerging local preference is to have two short periods during the day for the parking restrictions to be enforced - from around 11:00 am to 11:30 am and 2:00 pm to about 3:00 pm. This, it is thought, will eliminate 95% of fly parkers.

The same procedure has to be gone through whatever the period of the restriction and the legal, sineage and consultation costs are said to beapproximately the same. The village actually wants the 'light touch', however the GCC at the roadshow stated the operational period was to be 8:00 am to 8:00 pm and when challenged could give no good reason why - one of the reasons why their roadshow was considered a disaster.

[grahame]

I have a lot of sympathy for the parking problems faced by the residents of Kemble. However, the conditions imposed by the council to link planning permission with a parking scheme appear unreasonable when, prima facie, the car park can only improve the situation. Surely it's for the local council to sort out the parking issues, with or without an enlarged car park?

As an aside, my local station desperately needed an expanded station car  park a couple  years ago. In that instance the council put its money where its mouth is, dipped into its pocket and paid for it, and as far as I can tell, it has solved the problems of fly parking locally.

A village the size of Kemble (population under 1500) rarely has a train station at all, let alone an hourly service each way with many trains being through to London.    I suspect this might add to the value of properties within waking distance of the station rather more than "fly parking" decreases the values.  I'm not sure where this is leading me - just having the thought that there may be another element to the balance that hasn't yet been mentioned.

[Richard Fairhurst]

We have the middle-of-the-day restrictions on Church Lane and Dyers Hill, the two streets nearest to the station, here in Charlbury. They prevent residents from being able to leave their cars outside their houses (most houses in central Charlbury don't have off-street parking) and simply move the fly-parkers further into the town - particularly the bottom of Nine Acres Lane, which has become increasingly dangerous due to the number of parked cars. There was a recent case where the District Council's enforcement team prosecuted a Church Lane resident for parking outside their house during the midday period, and the case was thrown out by the court.

I would very strongly recommend against adopting such a scheme in Kemble. We would do much better here with a full residents' parking scheme, but unfortunately West Oxfordshire doesn't have the revenue to implement one thanks to their regressive free parking policy.

[Sapperton Tunnel]

I have a lot of sympathy for the parking problems faced by the residents of Kemble. However, the conditions imposed by the council to link planning permission with a parking scheme appear unreasonable when, prima facie, the car park can only improve the situation. Surely it's for the local council to sort out the parking issues, with or without an enlarged car park?

As an aside, my local station desperately needed an expanded station car  park a couple  years ago. In that instance the council put its money where its mouth is, dipped into its pocket and paid for it, and as far as I can tell, it has solved the problems of fly parking locally.

Cotswold District Council have taken a different approach to your local council. The philosophy is that if there is no railway station then there is no parking problem. There is a parking problem and therefore incumbent on the railway to help solve it. If the railway could guarantee that the car park would be free of charge for ever then again I doubt if there would be a parking problem. But they can't. So an entirely lawful condition has been included in the granting of planning permission which results in the cost going to GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway).  

[Sapperton Tunnel]

We have the middle-of-the-day restrictions on Church Lane and Dyers Hill, the two streets nearest to the station, here in Charlbury. They prevent residents from being able to leave their cars outside their houses (most houses in central Charlbury don't have off-street parking) and simply move the fly-parkers further into the town - particularly the bottom of Nine Acres Lane, which has become increasingly dangerous due to the number of parked cars. There was a recent case where the District Council's enforcement team prosecuted a Church Lane resident for parking outside their house during the midday period, and the case was thrown out by the court.

I would very strongly recommend against adopting such a scheme in Kemble. We would do much better here with a full residents' parking scheme, but unfortunately West Oxfordshire doesn't have the revenue to implement one thanks to their regressive free parking policy.

Thank you, Richard.

I will pass your comment on to the Parish Council and District Councillor as I guess posts on here are regarded as being in the public domain?

[grahame]

... I guess posts on here are regarded as being in the public domain?

Technical note.  All posts (including pictures) remain copyright of the author. However, they may be quoted onwards in critical review or comment.   You should always be AOK if you send people links to threads here, and speaking for myself I'm quite happy to be quoted in moderate chunks away from the board - happier still if I'm credited, and even happier if approached first.

Where something's posted to "Frequent Posters", "And Also", or the TransWilts Community Rail board, permission should always be sought before quoting away from here, even if the quote onward is not in public.

[ellendune]

Forgive the rambling on this as a number of posts have appeared since I started and I have tried to keep up to date with the comments.  

With regards to the legality of the residents parking scheme, I am told it is entirely legal. There are numerous instances where local authorities in urban areas have created car parks and then painted double yellow lines to stop on-street parking and introduced residents parking schemes. It is entirely legal to intrinsically link the provision of a residents parking scheme to that of providing a new car park.The parking scheme is of equal rank to that of proving a new car park, not a mitigation so a Section 106 is not required.

There is a difference between building a new road and a residents parking scheme.  

If the planning condition had been for GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) to build a access road they could build the new road at their expense without the need for the County Council to do it for them. The County Council could refuse to adopt the road (take over the maintenance of it), but the road would have been built and if that was a condition of the planning permission then they would have complied with it.  

You are correct that a residents parking scheme is perfectly legal. However GWR cannot implement a residents parking scheme because that would require a further legal instrument called a traffic regulation order (TRO^» (Trowbridge - next trains)) under the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984. TROs can only be made by the highway authority (in this case Gloucestershire County Council (GCC)). GWR is therefore powerless to comply with the planning condition.

If the only barrier was that GCC needed GWR to cover their costs of making the order and putting up the signs and painting the yellow and white lines, then I think this would have been covered by a Section 106 agreement.  However, residents fees would have to pay for the ongoing running costs.

A further complication is that the procedure for making such orders is set out in regulations. I am not an expert in this area but I would not be at all surprised if the regulations required GCC to demonstrate that it was necessary to make the order.  In that case GCC may not be able to make the order without the car park first being opened. That would be a catch 22.  

As an aside, my local station desperately needed an expanded station car  park a couple  years ago. In that instance the council put its money where its mouth is, dipped into its pocket and paid for it, and as far as I can tell, it has solved the problems of fly parking locally.

This seems a better solution it works elsewhere to my knowledge e.g. in Stoke Gifford near Bristol Parkway Station.   However it would still require GCC to make a TRO.  

Cotswold District Council have taken a different approach to your local council. The philosophy is that if there is no railway station then there is no parking problem. There is a parking problem and therefore incumbent on the railway to help solve it. If the railway could guarantee that the car park would be free of charge for ever then again I doubt if there would be a parking problem. But they can't. So an entirely lawful condition has been included in the granting of planning permission which results in the cost going to GWR.  

I cannot see how it can be lawful to impose a condition that the applicant has no power to comply with, particularly if GCC are unable to make the order without the car park first being opened!