Agenda and minutes

There were no declarations of personal interest.

RESOLVED that the decision record of the meeting of the Executive Board Member for Environment held on the 15^th December 2017 be signed as a correct record.

The Executive Board Member considered a report on the use of allocation of 2017/18 Welsh Government funding for pilot parking initiatives. 

The report apprised that the Welsh Government had allocated £180,000 to Carmarthenshire County Council through the Welsh Government’s Revenue Support Grant in order to fund pilot projects relative to parking.  The overall objective was to improve the customer experience to support the economy of town centres whilst providing a mix of sustainable travel options and manage traffic flows.  In addition, town centre traders had requested that the Council modernise the metering technology in order to support payment via wireless debit and credit card facilities at Council run car parks to support card payments to improve the customer experience.

The report provided descriptions and rationale of pilot parking initiatives that had been undertaken by the County Council which had been run in partnership with Chambers of Commerce and Town Councils.

The Executive Board Member noted that the Council’s Head of Highways and Transport submitted a monitoring report to the Welsh Government on the 31st August, 2017 which was appended to the report.  The Road Safety & Traffic Manager explained that the timescale had been delayed due to the lengthy tender exercise which was completed end of January 2018.

In response to a query made by the Executive Board Member regarding current payment methods, the Road Safety & Traffic Manager explained that all County Council town centre car parks operated a pre-payment system (pay and display).  However, in order to improve customer experience at the multi-storey carpark in Llanelli, the installation of a barrier controlled ‘pay on foot’ system which would require the driver to pay at a payment machine before returning to their vehicle was considered.

RESOLVED to approve the use of a £180,000 allocation from the Welsh Government in 2017/18 for pilot parking initiatives to procure and install new pre-payment (pay-and-display) parking ticket machines in various town centre car parks and a pay on foot system for the multi-storey car park in Llanelli, with the aim of improving the customer experience to support the economy of town centres.