Large number of residents don’t want permit parking

https://www.chichester.co.uk/news/business/rolls-royce-motor-cars-backs-county-council-parking-management-plan-for-chichester-1-8843426

I am a local resident of this area and am very concerned that the views of this Rolls Royce regarding this matter have been given a write up in your paper, suggesting it represents the views of the local residents.

Firstly, it is very important to understand that the issues of parking and traffic management in our local area are a problem largely caused by Rolls Royce employees.

The local residents have had to tirelessly campaign with Rolls Royce to get them to act to take some responsibility for taking control of these issues. It would appear that our Parish Council have consulted with Rolls Royce on this proposal, yet the Parish residents themselves, up to this point, have not been consulted, as to whether they wanted it to be considered.

We have had the opportunity to complete an online feedback form by the District Council, however there is much concern as to whether the District Council will in fact act on the feedback of the residents.

We have had planning notices go up around our streets in the last week, that suggest this is perhaps a forgone conclusion.

Recently, following the action taken by a local resident to write to the press, we gained coverage on South Today.

Further to that there was a meeting organised by the Parish Council in Westhampnett to outline the proposal of permitted parking and increased parking control in our area. This meeting was attended by two representative from Rolls Royce.

The clear issue at the meeting was, it is felt that none of these measures would be required if the RR employees did not use our streets as their car park. RR built a new car park which was opened early this year to resolve the issue.

However up until the beginning of the week where this was highlighted in the South Today program, this was not the outcome. Coincidentally, that week we saw significant changes in the parking of RR employees vehicles on our streets.

I pointed out at the meeting that, if RR could achieve this on the week that South Today were filming in our area, then it is possible to achieve this permanently.

I also spoke to the representative from RR at the meeting, who assured me that the parking would now remain at the level seen during that week. He also stated that there was no link between the pressure of local residents contacting local media and the sudden change in parking levels in our streets.

I would say that if the streets were to remain at the current levels of parking by RR employees, we would have no need to pursue the proposed permitted parking scheme. The small amount of ‘overspill’ parking from residential properties is normal in any urban area and causes no problems.

This proposed scheme is not welcomed by many residents as it would incur heavy costs to us in permits and is a costly scheme to implement and manage.

As we are a village on the outskirts of Chichester, it is not something that should be needed under any normal circumstances. In fact many of us chose to live in areas like this to avoid these very issues that we would experience living in town centres.

The remaining issues, that are of ongoing concern, are severe disruption to local traffic during Rolls Royce daytime shift changes at approx. 2.30pm. Also, the Rolls Royce shift changes at 11.30pm and 5am.

The noise created by the driving by the RR employees at these times also has caused great upset to residents living close to the road on Stane St.

I would suggest that any money invested in this area would be far better spent on traffic calming and speed management.

I have been a resident since 2013 and during this time the increased impact of RR on our area has been dramatic.

The level of staff they employ in their Westhampnett site has increased dramatically, something that a small locality cannot easily cope with. The original proposal when the site was approved surely would not have allowed/planned for these enormous changes.

The company also has a ‘green emissions’ policy. However, if the same number of vehicles are being used to get to this place of work, creating the same emissions, surely the fact that they are parking ‘off site’ does not change the impact on the environment.

Private buses are also run to the site for their employees from areas such as Bognor Regis . Again, these buses are noted to be, more often than not, carrying little to no passengers. These buses create emissions which are surely not being offset by this low level of usage.

I hope this gives you some understanding of the daily issues that such a small locality is frustrated by, caused largely by thoughtless and ill planned development and growth, both residential and commercial.

We have two new residential developments in our area as well to contend with. We seem to be seen largely as an area where Chichester District Council feel they can meet their targets for housing requirements by adding more infill developments.

Most importantly - please be clear that the permitted parking is most definitely not welcome by a large number of residents in this area.

There are also clear objections to proposed double yellow lines in some areas, particularly in Maudlin where many houses are older properties reliant on street parking. We have made this clear in the feedback document that we have completed online with the District Council.

Gael Emmett, Stane St, Maudlin