If you park in East Devon’s car parks for more than an hour and a half each week - get a permit! It’ll save you money and protect you against car park charge rises!
For various reasons, more of which later, East Devon District Council has had its hand forced and will be raising car park prices over the next few months. The exact nature of where and by how much is yet to be finalised, but effectively, category one (sea front, high volume areas) will be £2 an hour and more shopper oriented, category two car parks will be £1.50 an hour. On the face of it, that’s bad news. More to park your car when you go into town or visit an attraction locally.
The reasons for this are well worn and oft repeated, but I’ll do so again. EDDC have to provide core services such as rubbish collection and housing, and due to the cuts in funding from central government and the fact they are limited in their powers to raise funds, revenue has to be generated somewhere. Additionally, some local services that we hoped the government would help out with during the pandemic (as they have in other parts of the country) have been left to EDDC to fund - additional money they simply don’t have. And it goes without saying that unfortunately, EDDC costs have risen just as those of other businesses have - they’re not immune to this phenomenon. Our car parks are pretty much the cheapest in the South West, and by rights there should have been a more gradual rise over recent years but the previous administration chose not to - something which, in hindsight, looks like a vote-winning but irresponsible move.
So, the charges must rise. I don’t like it one bit, especially when areas such as St Andrew’s Road / Victoria Road and the Colony are under such pressure. Hopefully, soon, sometime, maybe, the planned residents parking scheme will come to fruition - Contact Councillor’s Scott and Trail at Devon County Council for more on that. And I’ll be fighting to try and get the best deal within the proposed changes in Exmouth that I can (Full Council is in a cou-le of weeks, where this will, hopefully, be finalised).
As I say, I don’t like this one little bit. But I understand and accept that it’s necessary.
Now, the good news!
As an East Devon resident, you’ll be delighted to hear that the winter parking scheme of £2 a day maximum will be in operation as normal this year. So from November, all of this is irrelevant for a few months. Park your car for the day for £2 and forget about it!
Additionally, and this is the one thing that I’d like you to take from this, is car parking permits. The cost of a permit from April is planned to be £120 annually. This will allow you to park in East Devon Car Parks for the whole year, day and night. It’s to be confirmed if this will include the category one car parks, but even so, if you visit the town, use the category two car parks (Imperial Road Overflow - the ‘other side’ of the railway station) and it’ll cost you nothing extra if you have a permit. Nada. Not a sausage.
This is effectively 30p a day. What’s more, you’ll be able to buy a monthly pass for £10, and set up a regular payment so that you can continue to pay monthly on an ongoing basis.
So I know it’s not great news, but there are ways round it. You may even save money! Once the permit scheme is up and running, I’ll let you know how to apply.
Cheers all, email me at jwhibley@eastdevon.gov.uk if you have any questions.
Joe
Cllr Scott’s email - richard.scott@devon.gov.uk
Cllr Trail’s email- jeff.trail@devon.gov.uk