Councillors push back on plans to double long-stay parking at Theatr Clwyd
Flintshire County Council officers have been asked to rethink plans to double long-stay parking charges at Theatr Clwyd that would have generated almost £40,000 for the authority.
Considering proposals by the council’s Streetscene and Transportation department to increase some parking charges in the county, councillors raised concerns that the increased charges at Theatr Clwyd could negatively impact the number of people choosing to visit the theatre.
The plans presented to Flintshire’s Environment and Economy Overview and Scrutiny Committee on Wednesday proposed keeping the cost of parking for two-and-a-half hours at Theatr Clwyd’s multi-tier car park at £1 but doubling the price of parking for up to 14 hours to £4, raising a potential £37,465 for the council.
They also proposed increasing the cost of parking for up to 24 hours at Flint train station from £2.50 to £5 – raising an additional £11,360 – and at Talacre, where it proposed a 50p increase to parking for 2-4 hours and a £1 increase for parking up to 11 hours to raise an extra £1,342.
But it was the potential impact on Theatr Clwyd that concerned councillors, who highlighted that the two-and-a-half hour tariff would not be enough for patrons visiting to watch a performance.
Committee chair Cllr Dave Evans was the first to raise the point: “Two and a half hours isn’t enough for a play in the evening.
“Therefore you could pay £1 and gamble that nobody’s going to come and ticket you at 9pm or pay £4. Can we include in there £2.50 for four hours – so you have the £1 for two-and-a-half, £2.50 for four hours and £4 – and then people can turn up at 6pm in the safe knowledge they’ve paid till the 10pm period, rather than having to rush out to put another pound in or pay extra?”
Cllr Dan Rose then asked whether the theatre had been consulted on the proposed changes.
“Obviously we’ve invested a lot in the theatre over the last couple of years with their upgrades, have we consulted the theatre,” he said.
“We’ve not got exact data on what’s being used, but they will know the average timespan of their shows and the timescales. That surely should have been our first step – to consult them and get that information and make certain they’re on board with the suggested changes.
“So the question is – has that been done?”
Officers responded to say that the changes were based purely on current car park usage figures.
“We don’t normally consult around car‑parking charges because obviously we’d have to consult more widely and we’d be at risk of excluding one group over another,” said Chief Officer for Streetscene and Transportation Katie Wilby.
“So we’d have to run a full public consultation which would be county‑wide in that instance, and obviously we don’t have that time liberty at this stage.”
Cllr Evans suggested that engaging with the theatre would have enabled officers to provide a more suitable proposal.
“Surely if we’d had comments from Theatr Clwyd in this report it would have made it easier for us to make some decisions,” he said.
“I am adding a recommendation that officers go away and consider bringing in an intermediate price that reflects theatre‑goers specifically in the evening, so it covers that time period – without the ‘do I pay the cheap price or do I pay a far more expensive price’ – so we come to a sensible resolve in the middle if possible.”
Deputy leader of the council Cllr Richard Jones urged caution however – highlighting the precarious finances Flintshire as an authority was already dealing with – suggesting councillors do not specify a £2.50 charge and give officers freedom to balance the books by increasing the long-stay charge further.
“We’ve already identified a £75,000 budget reduction and it’s likely that this change that you’re suggesting will have an effect on that number,” he said.
“So rather than specify a particular charge for a particular time, perhaps if they increased the 14‑hour charge to £5, you might be able to mitigate that loss of earnings.
“It is fair to allow the service to think about how they do that, to try and find that shortfall in the money somewhere else within that same banding.”
Committee members voted in favour of asking officers to reconsider their calculations to factor in an additional lower parking charge at Theatre Clwyd.
By Alec Doyle – Local Democracy Reporter
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