Agenda item

The lead petitioner addressed the Cabinet Member and raised a number of points, including the following:

·       The lead petitioner firstly highlighted that Hornbill Close was the only residential street in the vicinity, industrial and retail buildings filled the majority of the area;

·       Workers from the industrial sites were using Hornbill Close for parking to the extent that residents of the street were struggling to park their vehicles;

·       When residents had raised concerns directly to people parking on the road, they had experienced hostile and anti-social behaviour;

·       Taxis and minicabs often used the road to wait for fares and on numerous occasions had parked on the double yellow lines; pictures of this were submitted along with the petition;

·       An issue that had been exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic was that supermarket delivery vans had been unable to safely use the road for deliveries; some residents of the street had been shielding and relied upon deliveries of this nature;

·       There was not enough parking on Hornbill Close to accommodate residents and people working at the nearby industrial and retail buildings which was why the petitioners were requesting the introduction of a residents’ permit parking scheme.

Councillor Chamdal, Ward Councillor for Brunel, was also in attendance and made a number of points including:

• This was an ongoing issue, businesses and workers at the nearby industrial buildings had been parking on Hornbill Close for a long time; a similar petition had been raised in April 2020 to that effect;
• The problem was at its worst from Mondays to Fridays;
• The on-street parking provided on Hornbill Close would be appropriate for residents should it not be over-used by workers during the week. The people attending the industrial buildings for work should be using the sites for parking, not a nearby residential street;
• The Ward Councillor would be in favour of consulting with residents of Hornbill Close as to the type of parking scheme that could be applied.

The Cabinet Member highlighted two key aspects to the petition, the parking issue at hand and the anti-social behaviour experienced by residents. It was noted that, in a number of instances across the Borough, the two aspects came hand in hand and a productive dialogue between the Council and private companies about the behaviour of workers who may be using residential roads for parking purposes could be opened up to facilitate a more respectful environment. Councillor Chamdal noted that he had previously spoken to local businesses about the issue and the response had been that the companies were not violating any parking arrangements. Officers were interested in understanding the balance between taxis and workers from the industrial buildings in terms of the non-residential use of parking on Hornbill Close.

The lead petitioner confirmed that the parking issue mainly presented itself on weekdays up to around 5:30pm. Officers highlighted that, upon first inspection, Hornbill Close would be an ideal candidate for a fairly new style of Parking Management Scheme entitled ‘Resident Permit Parking Past This Point’. This would simplify the way in which a PMS could be implemented by negating the need for other measures such as bay markings; this would limit parking on the street, during agreed upon times, to residents and vehicles with a valid permit or visitors voucher. Officers also noted that there was a small number of private parking areas in Hornbill Close that would not be affected by any PMS; further to this, should a scheme like this be adopted, repeater signs would need to be put up to ensure anyone accessing the road was aware of the PMS.

The Cabinet Member thanked the lead petitioner and Ward Councillor for attending the hearing and informed them that a series of consultations would need to take place before any PMS could be adopted. Although the timing of any consultation could not be identified, the lead petitioner was asked to encourage residents of Hornbill Close to engage with any prospective consultation that may take place.

RESOLVED that the Cabinet Member for Public Safety and Transport:

1)    Met with petitioners and listened to their concerns over non-residential parking in Hornbill Close;

2)    Asked officers to add the request for a residents’ permit parking scheme to the Council’s extensive Parking Management Scheme Programme for a possible informal consultation; and

3)    Referred the reports from petitioners of anti-social behaviour to the Council’s Anti-Social Behaviour Team for further investigation.