How city has milked motorists for three decades

Published on Tuesday 28 July 2009 09:42

THE CAPITAL'S drivers are victims of "highway robbery" said motoring organisations today after new figures showed how the cost of running a car in the city has soared.

On-street parking fees across large parts of Edinburgh have risen by more than five times the rate of inflation since they were introduced in 1973, research carried out by the Evening News has shown.

Parking permits have also gone up marginally above the rate of inflation, while standard parking fines are three times what they were a decade ago.

Successive city council regimes were today accused of using the charges as "stealth taxes" to help swell the city's coffers. Parking fees and fines brought in a record-breaking 20 million last year – two-and-a-half times what they did just ten years ago.

David Legge, of the Association of British Drivers, said: "There is a real lack of on-street parking in Edinburgh and the council is rationing it so that only the rich can afford it – it's highway robbery.

"We don't need any more stealth taxes. What we need is the council to invest in some off-street parking and lay off the motorist."

Philip Gomm, of the RAC Foundation, said drivers had long feared that parking fees were "no more than a revenue raiser".

He added: "Edinburgh's motorists will not be surprised to hear parking charges have risen way above inflation, but that will not stop them being angered.

"The fear is that in the middle of a credit crunch the temptation to keep raising money from hard-pressed motorists will prove too much for councillors in Edinburgh to resist."

When introduced in 1973, on-street parking charges were 5p for the Capital's "inner zone" in the immediate city centre and 2.5p for the "outer zone."

Had the charges risen in line with the average inflation rate, as calculated by the Bank of England, they would today sit at 45p and 23p, but are actually 2 and 1.20 respectively.

That means the cost of parking outside the city centre has soared by more than five times the rate of inflation.

Edinburgh's permits remain among the most expensive in Scotland, with only residential parking in Glasgow city centre costing more. They have risen at just above the inflation rate since their introduction in 1974.

Parking fines have also gone from 20 to 60 in just over a decade, although the fee falls to 30 if paid within 14 days.

The increase in charges has been coupled with a massive growth in the number of motorists being hit by them.

Thousands more are now paying for permits following repeated expansions of the city's controlled parking zone.

The number of fines issued has more than doubled, to around 230,000 a year, since the council took responsibility for enforcement from the police in 1997.

The city's income from fines, pay-and-display and permits rose by more than 3m last year, in the wake of an expansion of the controlled parking zone, which now takes in 24,000 residents.

Tom Rye, of Edinburgh Napier University's Transport Research Institute, suggested the city is using on-street parking charges as a blunt instrument, rather than tailoring them to meet varying demand.

Local authorities had not traditionally received enough funding from central government for transport priorities, but all funding was handed over by the Scottish Government for councils to do with as they wished, he said.

"In certain places in Edinburgh the price of on-street parking is not high enough and in some places it's too high," he added.

"At any one time a street should have about 85 per cent of its spaces occupied, but if you look at a street like George Street that is often more like 100 per cent – maybe the price should go up there.

"There are other areas of the city where the price is too high and I don't think the council has been as enthusiastic about looking at where it could put the price down as to where to put it up. But if the council did not limit the amount of parking then what would that do to the historic city centre? "

Since 2005, the city's transport chiefs have raised 26 million from parking tickets and a further 41m from pay and display machines.

Some city motorists are also braced for even higher charges. Should Edinburgh introduce its planned green parking permit scheme next year, then drivers of "gas guzzlers" will end up paying 320 a year for a permit.

The council said it is legally bound to spend any surplus from parking charges and permits on off-street parking, public transport and road improvement schemes.

Council transport convener Gordon Mackenzie said: "The Council tries to balance the competing needs of residents, visitors and businesses through the provision of parking facilities, public transport and a variety of other means. We've increased the number of parking spaces in the city centre, provided more park-and-ride facilities and are using modern technology to try to improve information for drivers to direct them to where they can park.

"Any surplus parking income is used to improve the city's transport infrastructure and, with that, deliver economic, environmental and quality of life benefits as widely as possible across the city."

END OF THE ROAD FOR ROUNDABOUTS COSTS 7 MILLION

TRANSPORT chiefs have spent more than 7 million scrapping a number of city roundabouts, new figures show.

Between 2000 and 2008, road bosses undertook a number of projects across the city, including replacing Portobello's Seafield roundabout with traffic lights.

The current estimated cost of that particular project stands at just under 2.5m, but council insiders believe the final bill could yet soar up to 2m over the original 1.7m budget.

Details of the roundabout replacement projects, which were obtained by the Evening News using freedom of information laws, include more than 2m having been spent on removing two roundabouts on Milton Road, Duddingston.

Motorists have frequently questioned how necessary many of these major projects have been.

But the city council said the work has been necessary to improve safety and speed up traffic flows.

They also said much of the work was paid for by 10.5m worth of funding it obtained from the Scottish Government's Access to Growth fund in 2004.

The council also secured money from developers' contributions for work at the Fort Kinnaird shopping centre and at stores belonging to Asda, Tesco and Sainsbury's.

Council transport convener, Gordon Mackenzie said: "The thinking behind all junction improvements is to allow more efficient and safer traffic flow, particularly for public transport, plus improved safety for pedestrians and cyclists."