EXCLUSIVE: East Suffolk residents will face 30% increase in parking charges
East Suffolk Council say we can expect the rise to come into place within the next 3 months.
Figures revealed exclusively to us show how much East Suffolk Council has collected through parking fines since 2021.
Not only this, but the cost to pay to park in this area is expected to go up by around 30% within the next three months.
We spoke to the Counsellor for Rendlesham - and Cabinet Member for Economic Development - Tim Wilson.
He told us that in the last five years, the council has issued over 77,000 PCN tickets, creating an income of £2.5 million**** for the council.
Where does this money go?
We asked Tim what happens to this money and what it's spent on.
He said "The income from all PCN notices is really strictly prohibited in what it can be spent on...that's set by the Road Traffic Regulation Act of 1984..but we are only spending this money on one thing, and that's making good the deficit generated by the department."
He explained that every year for the past five years the parking department, has lost £1.1 million, because they run these services at a deficient.
"Keeping the car parks safe, well lit, well surfaced, keeping the machines running so that you can buy a ticket, keeping the cycle racks up to date, keeping the signage appropriate up to date, well lit, installing things like EV chargers. All of that carries a cost."
He went on to say that East Suffolk Council takes care of 90 car parks, 72 of which require payment to park - and something like resurfacing the ground to eradicate potholes can cost £140,000.
"So even if the cost was £100,000 - for 90 car parks, that's £9 million and resurfacing broadly at last 10 or 12 years, so that's £9 million+ we have to spend every 10 or 12 years." He added.
30% increase in parking charges in the next few months
Tim said this financial loss is a contributing factor as to why they will be raising the prices in the next few months.
"The charges in car parks haven't changed for quite a while and they haven't even risen with the cost of inflation in the last five years.
"Later this year, across the district, there will be a price increase between 20%, 27% to 30% just simply to to keep pace with the consumer price index rise over the last five years."
Tim also told us about changes to car parks that we can expect to see.
"Over this next 12 month period, there's new cycle racks going in almost every car park, there's new signage going in every car park and some of those signs are a decade old.
"We're upgrading every single pay and display machine because again, some of those are almost a decade beyond their projected end of life, and they all need to be take contactless payment, and we are installing about £330,000 worth of EV charging infrastructure in certain car parks across the district.