Hunter House Road - have your say on the permit parking scheme proposal in this and surrounding roads.

The city council has written to every home in part of Hunter’s Bar to ask them for their views on a proposal to include their area in a permit parking scheme.  The scheme would include Hunter House Road, Hunter Hill Road, Roach Road, Penrhyn Road, Pinner Road, Fulmer Road, Guest Road, Stretton Road, Sandbeck Place, Osberton Place, Junction Road, Hardwick Crescent and parts of Cowlishaw Road and Psalter Lane.

The reason this proposal has come forward is because the council agreed to review the existing Sharrow Vale Permit Parking Scheme following comments from local residents and businesses after it had been in operation for a year.  I chaired a well-attended meeting at the start of the year when people came along to express their views.

The result of this has been the council looking at ways to improve the existing scheme and looking at the effect the permit parking scheme has had on the surrounding area.  It is fair to say that opinion on whether to extend the scheme to the Hunter House Road area has been divided, with strong opinions on both sides.  That is why the council is now carrying out a further consultation in the area to see whether people are happy with the proposed scheme or not.  Details of the proposed scheme can be viewed on the Sheffield City Council website here, which also gives you details on how to make your views known.

Finally, it’s worth mentioning a few points that have already come up:

• The main proposal is to split up the existing large Sharrow Vale Permit Parking Scheme (which stretches from Hunter’s Bar & Endcliffe Vale Road all the way down to London Road) in to a number of smaller schemes so they can be tailored to suit the specific problems in that area.  The main downside to this however is that your permit would only be valid in a smaller area.
• The majority of changes are changing road markings to create extra parking spaces and to ensure there is a balance between the needs of residents and of the people whose businesses depend on people driving in to the area.
• Some extra roads are being added in to the permit parking system, the biggest of which is the Hunter House scheme, as both the council and some residents felt that by being surrounded by permit schemes they would end up suffering from being just outside the boundary.  When a permit scheme is created some people who would have parked inside the permit scheme area instead park in the surrounding roads taking up space that would have been used by those local residents.
• Since the Liberal Democrats took control of the city council they have cut the cost of parking permits to just £10 for a year and £30 for any extra permits needed. The cost is now designed just to cover the cost of running the permit scheme rather than to make any money for the council.
• Permits are only available to residents and businesses within the permit scheme area.  There is also a system that allows you to buy temporary visitor permits for when people come to visit you.
• These proposals are not set in stone - do tell us and the council directly what you think.

To let your local Liberal Democrat team know your views, then please click here to complete our short survey