1

J

…and they wonder why Islanders are cynical about the States…

Thank you for showing this up!

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3

Dave

Another indirect tax which will hurt ‘middle Jersey’ workers who have to park in St Helier. This is much more unfair than the recent proposed increase in alcohol tax.

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5

eeyore

Well its just blooming typical. I don’t have objections to the cash being used for the elderly or the cycle track as this makes life easier all around, but if that money is just sitting there why not plough it back into the existing car-parks. Or making the roads safer around town and the rest of the island for cyclists/motorbike users.

If we’re in credit by so much why are they putting up the car-park charges by so much.

What are our duly elected idiots doing about this too. Sitting in the states chambers earning their £40,000+ a year. They get free parking so they don’t care do they.

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7

Adrian

How do you get a figure of 8% my simple maths makes it over 13%

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9

Islander

Now you can see why I very rarely go into town. Having paid all that to park my car I often found that the shops do not have what I want and I am told to come back again next week, meaning that I would waste even more time and pay even more for parking.

It is now so much easier to do all my shopping on the internet, apart from food, and it is delivered to my front door. It is also much cheaper doing it that way even if it is in stock here.

On the very rare occasions when I have to go into town I find that many of the shops I used to know have closed and others are empty.

If parking was cheaper and easy then I might start going back again.

Being a pensioner I would need to have time to stop for some lunch between visiting the shops. That uses up too much of my limited parking time and further wastes the trip in.

I also have to be able to predict how much time I am going to spend there. If I get through faster than expected I have paid more than I should have. If I take longer then I get fined and would never go back again.

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11

Outsider

Why not save money and do a little bit for the environment at the same time?

Get rid of the scratch cards. Bring in automated barriers. Saves printing costs, saves litter, saves a huge amount of confusion for tourists, saves salaries on parking attendents. Apologies to any currently employed in this job – it’s nothing personal but I think it farsical we pay people to check for scratch cards in this day and age. The rest of the civilised world use barriers and technology, why can’t we.

Introduce barriers and pay as you leave. On street parking can be done by meter and wardens can still monitor those.

Keeps costs down for everyone, and does a little for the environment.

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13

Nellie Macon

Don’t forget that much of the revenue raised from parking fees also goes towards subsidising Connex.

Despite the fact that we only have one major industry and so most of our working population has to come into St Helier, TTS are determined to keep cars out of town.

Many of the workers are mothers who have to drop off and collect small children and are thus forced to use a car. Add these extortionate parking fees to childcare costs and it’s no wonder that many mothers wonder whether it’s worth working or not.

Carry on like this TTS and all you’ll achieve ia a lot more people on income support because it’s too expensive to work!

Or is the plan to price us out of the car parks and use it for housing or office blocks?

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15

Mulvie Le Phew

Good piece of journalism, just what we need to know, not surprising though unfortunately. how much money do the Uk government make from motorists which is used to prop up the economy.

This money should be ring fenced for improving the roads and charges only increased when money is needed for more works which in realtiy would mean a reduction in parking charges.

Let’s not forget when charges were introduced for on street parking we were told it was to deter parking on the street which was previously free using discs.

This is over 10% increase at a time when those of us lucky enough to have jobs have had no pay rise. Poor timing, I don’t dount the states are cash strapped but appropriate spending would help here ie don’t spend £8,000 on calendars with pictures of Tezza the clown on the front.

Can those who wanted to spend £14,000,000 that’s 14 million buying Plemont now see why it was wrong, there’s no money in the pot.

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17

JK44

Yet another rising cost that I will soon not be able to afford. Is there any point me even owning a car anymore?

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19

Tim

Why did they need to take money from the stimulus fund to pay for the improvement works on Victoria Avenue, when this £12m was already there, pretty much for such a job?!

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21

Tom Jones

Unless the net surplus within this govt function is legally hypothecated for car parking maintenance and expenses presumably they can do what they want with the surplus and just treat as part of general taxation. The rise in the price of scratchcards shouldn’t really be judged in relation to the surplus. Its more a case of is this increase in taxation reasonable given the overall level and increase in taxation levied on the individual. Sorry but I think we need corporates to pay a bit more tax over here. And cut about 20% of civil servants.

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23

JPV

Who’s doing the Maths here? Either way you look at it (hourly or monthly), it is almost 14%.

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25

Dave

I know, we wont give our states workers a pay rise in line with the cost of living but what we’ll do is, spend half a million quid on a cycle track during the height of recession and then bump the parking charges up for a laugh, just in case we feel like building another steam clock that blows buubles or something similar!! ABSOLUTE AMATEURS.

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27

DAVE

If you look at the gov website, the charges have increased by inflation plus an additional 10%! Absolutely unbelievable. If everyone refused to pay the increase and parked illegally in the car parks, and refused to pay the fines what could they do?

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29

BS Deluxe

Can somebody please tell me why we are susidising Connex again.

Surely the bus prices should be at a discount if this is the case otherwise aren’t we paying twice for the same shoddy service??

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31

cgt

If there is twelve million in a bank account why the need to put the price up. Agree about automated barriers, when i see the adverts in the j e p for ticket issuers the wages they get is astounding especially considering it is not a skilled job. Seriously thinking that im having the right royal **** takin out of me with the cost of living here, think it is only a matter of time before people start cashing in there assets and moving on.

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33

Roy Travert

Everybody had better brace themselves because these are the rest of the Taxes TTS will be bringing in to offset Senator Ozouf’s spending.

An environmental tax..
A purchase tax on new vehicles…yes that correct!!…the new non polluting ones..
Road Pricing/Congestion charge…you will be charged on distance traveled and time of day..
Increase on fuel duty of 2p a litre..
Taxing private car parking spaces..
Increase in parking charges to subsidise the bus service and build cycle tracks.. now implemented
An MOT style test..
An emissions tax…its strange that the policy states that old classic cars would not be able to pass this test. And gives the impression that they would be exempt…That’s the point isn’t it? That they get taxed because they are polluting the air we breath!

I published the real facts on the proposed tax increases from TTS on my site last year. And it now appears that the first part of the increases are now being implemented (see above). This is being done with no regard to the fragile stat of Jersey’s once booming economy and the people it affects. The Taxpayer.

TTS have now put 14% on the price of parking; a pay card will now cost 66 pence an hour instead of 58 pence. Monthly parking charges for long stay car parks will also increase from £94 a month to £107. This is only the first part of a new raft of taxes that will be brought in to balance the States massive deficit. And it’s us the motorist who are the easy targets to get hit every time more money is needed on wasteful projects. And the best part is that if you stay over your time you can now go online and pay your fine to save some money!

I know….words escape me too…

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35

Warren J

While Constable Jackson targets the motorist, he is happy to turn a blind eye to the boat owners who park their boats illegally in Ouaisne car park.

I wrote to him on this subject last summer and his response was that due to the spring tide, he quite expected boat owners to park there! (Despite clear signs to say that boats should be parked in the designated boat parking area
) He does of course have an interest in boating.

Clearly having a constable as president of a major comittee is unacceptable and inappropriate. His inability to enforce laws in his own parish brings a big question mark.

If Roy Travert is right, and I believe he proably is, the island needs to take action. It is unacceptable that the lives of the general public are made difficult and expensive as they go about their daily lives. Actioin is now required. Anyone remember why Margaret Thatcher backed down on the ill thought out Poll Tax ? Demonstartions and direct action of a similar nature WOULD get results

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37

Michael

Warren J
Posted January 31, 2010 at 10:35 am While Constable Jackson targets the motorist, he is happy to turn a blind eye to the boat owners who park their boats illegally in Ouaisne car park.

I wrote to him on this subject last summer and his response was that due to the spring tide, he quite expected boat owners to park there! (Despite clear signs to say that boats should be parked in the designated boat parking area
) He does of course have an interest in boating.

Warren welcome to the Jersey Way

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39

J Lamborrari

@ Brendan #16
“66 PENCE PER HOUR. THIEVES.”
Hardly, 66p/hr for parking isn’t really that much. Try taking a look at NCP prices in the UK; people alway bleat on about how expensive is compared to the UK, but they’re all suddenly quiet on this issue.

I just took two examples from NCP car parks, and for a days parking (assuming an 8hr day is worked) the prices were £1.75 & £3.33/hr.

66p is pretty cheap in comparison, and certainly not theft.

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41

joker

If people sign petitions etc for town parks and cycle tracks where do they think the money is going to come from… the sky?

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43

Mac

I am going to draw the ire of pretty well everyone here when I say that I was disgusted by the 8p/hour rise in the cost of parking.

It should have been 80p/hour.

As it stands, the price of parking in Jersey is way, way cheaper than mainland UK. Where I used to live, £1.30 for 30 minutes was not uncommon. The fact that the parking is so cheap means that there is no incentive whatsoever to use the buses – the cost of one trip to town and back, three miles each way, is now £2.20 on the not-very-frequent buses. I can nip in in the car, park for two hours and come back for less. And you wonder why the traffic snarls up in St Helier?

I thought that things would get better after Guy the Puffin Killer went on his merry way and TTS announced they were going to push sustainable transport. So we have Mike Jackson putting between 7 and 20 per cent onto bus fares, no improvement in services, an apology for the 10% rise in car parking charges, and the money being taken to make a cycle path to Gorey (which already has the island’s most frequent bus service). The fact that trying to cycle anywhere north out of St Helier is ludicrously dangerous (steep narrow hills + heavy traffic + slow-moving cyclists = recipe for trouble) gets ignored. It takes a significant amount of perverse genius to cock things up quite that badly and ensure that traffic problems in town are going to get worse – much worse – instead of better

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45

Carl

Typical of the anti-car brigade to jump on this and compare St.Helier to a major UK city!
You should compare our town with similar sized small towns around the UK – where you’ll find that parking prices are nowhere near big city prices.

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47

J Lamborrari

@ Carl #45
Doncaster Pop. ~70k: 1hours parking = £1.80

@ truthseeker #46
Please explain (and I know that if you follow your normal form there’ll be no reply, but I can live in hope) why my comparison with NCP is ‘strange or odious’

What else would you compare the cost of parking to truthseeker?

After your rebellion what would you do truthseeker; would you lower parking charges? put up barriers? make the bus service free? …how would you fund your plans?

I assume you have thought about it before crying “rebel!”

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49

Bob Fleming

I’m not sure you can compare Jersey’s parking prices with towns in Britain can you?

Surely parking in town centres in Britain is more a matter of choice than necessity, as it is here. They have trains, buses (good ones), park and ride schemes, whilst we have, well no alternatives if you live out of town and not on a main bus route.

Surely the only decent comparison we can make is with Guernsey, and I believe that the parking in St Peter Port is still free. How do they achieve that?

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51

Warren J

For thouse who think parking charges should be brought into line with some areas of the UK, would they also wish to pay the same levels of Council Tax – typically £1,750 per year, and similar rates of insurance on their houses and cars – typically double what we pay over here. And VAT / GST at 17.5% allong with income tax rates of 20% / 40% / 50% together with Capital Gains Tax and Inheritance Tax

Be carefull what you wish for !

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53

J Lamborrari

@ Leah Holmes #52
Just for the sake of comparison, which town are are you thinking of?

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55

bella

#54 Andy
And make sure it is not 1 inch over the allocated place.
Also don,t sneeze while driving as they count that as careless.
Don’t drop a £10 note or you will be done for littering.
That,s exactly what happened recently by an over-zealous jobsworth.

Stealth tax or highway robbery?

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57

J Lamborrari

@ Leah Holmes #56
“…let’s go one better and look at the West End of Glasgow…”
According to the government website parking in this area costs 60p an hour, and they charge at a lesser rate over-night and on Sundays. These prices were set over two years ago, so they’ve been higher than Jersey for all that time, and I would expect they’ll be rising in the near future.

So it would cost more to park there than in St Helier.

I’ve no doubt there will be free parking available too, but I note from the same site that the council are introducing residential parking schemes in several places, and this may impact on parking availability.

I think this shows that parking in Jersey is not the ‘rip-off’ that some people claim it to be.

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59

BS Deluxe

Is everyone now missing the point of the article!!

The fact is there is £12 million sitting in a Car Park Trading a/c so why are the charges being raised when it is clearly not needed for this purpose??

Perhaps they should use this money to build a decent underground car park instead!

Also “Just this last £500,000 was taken from the account to pay for the eastern cycle track, linking Gorey to town and beyond and there are further plans to siphon off money to invest in the Island’s sewerage system and health care for the elderly.”

Isn’t this illegal or fraudulent????

The money in this a/c is specifically for Car Park Trading (hence the name) so should be spent on Car Parks shouldn’t it??

What other pots is the Treasury “stealing” from to fund other projects?

In my opinion this is very murky dealing and in an island where our main industry is finance which is highly regulated we should expect the same for publc, yes PUBLIC, monies too.

Please explain this Mr Ozouf.

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61

J Lamborrari

@ Leah Holmes #57
There is still free parking in St Helier too, maybe there’s ‘plenty’because they have more space. People think that cities suffer from having little space, but there are plenty of streets in London for example that have one-way streets as wide as Victoria avenue; this allows for a much easier flow of traffic and less congestion, with more room for parking spaces.

St Helier simply does not have that much space.

I find it interesting that some people DON’T put in any effort to find the facts before they spout of their ignorant opinions on these forums.

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63

J Lamborrari

@ Leah Holmes # 62
“…If you’re suggesting my opinion on this is ignorant you’re wrong…”
I wasn’t, I was just pondering why somebody should think it interesting that somebody has thought about their argument, rather than than when people clearly don’t.

“…living in both places gives me far more an idea than you could possibly have…”
Here’s a question Leah; where do I live? Where have I lived? Is it possible I too have lived in both places? Perhaps i’ve lived in many places, you don’t know, and you never bothered to put the effort to find out before making an ignorant and arrogant statement.

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65

J Lamborrari

@ Leah Holmes #64
I find it quite odd that you find it interesting when people bother to look up information, but think they’re picking a fight just because they think it arrogant when you spout off about how you’re more informed than they could possibly be based on unfounded assumptions.

Please explain what behaviour I’ve shown that would make any assumption about where I’ve lived reasonable, in the context of this debate/issue. Are you saying that rather than using actual facts I should ‘qualify’ my arguements with a claim of personal experience?

I’ve no problem accepting that people’s opinions differ, or that some people’s opinions are based on experience, but how exactly, when talking about the cost and availability of parking, is ‘picking a fight’ to point out that the experiences of one person do not actually match the facts, and their limited anecdotal experience does not make a fair comparison?

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67

J Lamborrari

@ Leah Holmes #66
“Well for starters because my ‘anecdotal experience’ is not limited…”
Then I bow to your infinite experience Leah, I’ve never met anybody who claimed to have unlimited experience… and was telling the truth.

“…You attacked me for not asking about you and your experience when, indeed, you never ask anyone about theirs…”
Fair comment… if it wasn’t a lie.

“…You cannot claim that Glasgow City Council’s website is fact…”
True, I guess, but are you saying any of the information I’ve used in my argument *is* actually false, or are you just bleating because it goes some way to counter your argument.

“…I would never claim that the States of Jersey website is fact…”
I don’t imagine you’ve any reason to consult any website or source of anykind for information, thanks to your infinte experience and all.

“…You fail to realise that since Glasgow City Council make money from parking they are going to advertise charged parking over free parking…”
No I don’t, that’s wrong; where exactly have I said that?

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