Car parking strategy

Our town centre car parking objectives are to:

• provide car parking which meets the current and future needs of the town centre for visitors, businesses and residents that will live in the town centre

• optimise the cost-efficiency of the car park assets

• minimise congestion and improve air quality

The strategy covers a 10 year period, with actions analysed into:

• short term (1 year)

• medium term (2-5 years)

• long term (5-10years)

This strategy reviews the current car parking provision and sets out the future options to ensure that the most effective provision is made. In order to do this a range of issues have been taken into account:

• customer views and stakeholder perception

• the usage of car and capacity of the car parks

• financial appraisal of car parks as assets

• links to the wider strategic transport needs including on street parking and road congestion

• longer term national and technologic developments

The council plan 2018-2022 sets out our vision to have "good local services, a prosperous borough and safe and welcoming places for all".

The four corporate priorities are:

• local services that work for local people

• growing our people and places

• a healthy, active and safe borough

• a town centre for all

We want to ensure that the town centres have the right retail, public service, leisure, cultural, business and residential facilities that work for local residents and attract visitors and businesses to the town centres. To achieve this, we want to deliver car parking services that support the town centres.

Car parking plays an important role in the town centre and the wider transport links to the area. Our car parks create a lasting impression for visitors, who we want to encourage to return to support our town centre businesses.

We are working hard with partners to improve air quality. Provision of car parking that is easily accessed and close to the place which the driver wishes to visit is important to ensure that unnecessary congestion is not caused by drivers blocking up key access roads looking for places to park.

Newcastle, like many areas across the UK, continues to experience areas of poor air quality. The air quality assessment identified that there are road links to the town centre that are currently exceeding the annual mean nitrogen dioxide (NO2) limit value, with exceedances predicted to continue in 2019 and beyond.

In October 2018, Ministers Coffey and Norman for the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) and Department for Transport (DfT) respectively, served the ministerial direction on us. This was served under the provisions of The Environment Act 1995 (Feasibility study for nitrogen dioxide compliance). The ministerial directions formally mandate several local authorities, including Newcastle, to undertake further work with the main objective being to explore options for reducing levels of nitrogen dioxide in the air. The provision of good quality car parks in the right locations can assist in improving air quality.