Seafront Parking Petition

The new parking meters are a mixed blessing, but it appears to be a mixture of bad and very bad...

Anyone who feels the that CCC have short-changed the people of Herne Bay and its vistors, I have a Petition in my shop at 91 Mortimer Street. Please come and sign it.

Kind regards,

Andrew Lawrence, Speciality Foods.

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By the end of July, CCC had collected about £18,000 in fines from the evil robots. I think it's safe to assume that locals will be irritated, and visitors may be discouraged, by the diligent meter-watching and enthusiastic fining. It's important to remember that the money collected from the meters is "ring-fenced" and can only be spent on parking-related stuff - more meters for instance.

Local shop-keepers have a pretty shrewd idea of the footfall they could have expected over the last few months. Some are finding that it just hasn't happened, and are blaming the ill-considered parking restrictions for leaving them seriously out of pocket.

We need more information on this. We need to know from CCC whether this scheme is working as they planned and expected. We need to know from local shop-keepers, restaurateurs, publicans, B&Bs, etc whether business is up or down. Then we can weigh up the costs and benefits, and decide whether the scheme is worth keeping.