Families living in Diamond Road, Colonial Road, Australia Road, Canada Road, India Road, Aldin Avenue North, Princes Street and Connaught Road in Slough, have voiced their upset at the decision to implement the ‘experimental’ parking scheme outlined in a letter sent out on Monday March, 9.
From May 1, between 8am and 10pm Monday to Friday, residents will have to display permits priced £25 for the first car and £50 for the second, while visitors will have a two hour free period before having to pay between £2.50 and £15 for three hours up to one week.
Residents against the scheme say that rather than solving the current parking issue in the area, the scheme will mean a loss of parking spaces and will cause more financial worry to residents.
Babar Khalil visits his mother, who is widowed and suffers from knee problems, in Aldin Avenue North with his disabled son, several times a week.
Mr Khalil brings his son to enable him access to his disabled tricycle which is kept at his mother’s home as it is too big to accommodate at his own.
The residents accept that the parking ‘is not perfect’ but say that since staff from businesses Yell and QA have stopped parking in the roads 18 months ago, parking is much less of an issue.
Mohammed Khurshid, chair of Slough Central Community Association as well as voluntarily running Slough Central Football Club, says that the three door-knocking surveys that he has done with a group of residents, since 2011, have shown the majority are against the parking scheme.
New yellow lines will prevent Muhammad Khalild Jameel Latif from parking outside his own home, despite the fact he will still have to pay for a permit. He says it is ‘simply not acceptable’.
Slough Borough Council says it has received petitions for and against residents’ parking and it is through formal consultations, public meetings, informal surveys from residents and local councillors that they have arrived at this decision, assuring residents that as it is an experimental scheme, it can be altered if there are problems.
The council also says it has received complaints that groups have been ‘intimidating residents into having a particular view’ and that anyone with specific issues, for example people with disabled family members, should contact them directly.
