No parking problems in Newcastle's Parkstone Avenue, say council

FAMILIES have lost their campaign to stop motorists parking outside their homes all day.

Residents living in Parkstone Avenue, Newcastle, have complained for months about cars left on the busy street for hours at a time.

They believe many of the vehicles belong to staff and patients at the nearby University Hospital of North Staffordshire, as well as shoppers who park up before walking into the town centre.

A petition of 69 names was signed, asking for parking restrictions to be brought in allowing motorists to leave their vehicles for no longer than two hours at a time.

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A series of letters was also penned calling on the council to take action, with concerns also raised about congestion created by the nearby Newcastle-under-Lyme School.

But now their campaign has been dismissed by Newcastle Borough Council's joint parking committee.

During a meeting with the residents, committee members explained that a survey had revealed not enough cars were parking in the street to cause any problems.

The road was inspected for a week, in both the morning and the evening.

But residents say the survey – which monitored the road for two two-hour periods each day – was not thorough enough.

John Smith, a grandfather-of-five who has lived in the street for more than 10 years, said: "It's ridiculous. They've told us we will have to wait until April and then they might look into it again.

"The problem is they only looked at the street between 7.30am and 9.30am, and 3.30pm and 5.30pm.

"The main problem is during the day when people leave their cars in what they seem to think is a free car park outside our homes."

Mr Smith's 65-year-old neighbour Dave Morton said: "The council says it will look at it next April when the new budgets come in. So something could still happen, but it's not good enough."

The committee's survey did identify some vehicles parking in the street all day, which were found to be owned by non-residents.

It is believed these may have belonged to families visiting patients at the hospital.

Documents prepared for this week's meeting state: "Parking levels in the afternoon numbered between four and eight and, while unable to verify the reason the additional afternoon drivers were present, we believe they were most likely visiting the hospital (with afternoon visiting times generally of 3pm to 4.30pm).

"Observed leaving times of some vehicles were from 4.45pm to 5.40pm, further suggesting these were visitors to the hospital.

"No parking observed caused obstruction to residents' driveways except one incident where a visitor to one resident parked across the drive of a neighbour.

"There is congestion during school drop-off and pick-up times, as would be expected near to a school."