Blackburn Council scrap parking charges on Saturdays 

Blackburn Life welcome the announcement that Blackburn with Darwen Council are to scrap charges in council run car parks on Saturdays.

It will include the controversial Feilden Street Carp Park near Waves, but does not include on-street parking meters or private car parks such as The Mall.

Although in such austere times, this may appear to be a brave move, could it be that these council run car parks were taking so little money that the loss of revenue is negligible? It is not the first time the council have trialled free parking schemes and it was only last year that a scheme to offer free on-street parking on roads such as St. Peter’s Street were scrapped in the town. The new scheme does not include the on-street pay and display locations.

In our target=”_blank”>review of the year we highlighted that a main priority for the town was to consider free parking.  To extend the scheme to the whole week, with say, the first hour free, would indeed boost the local economy and help local businesses and the new market. It would also give traffic wardens the needed job of prioritising illegal parking and people misusing loading and disabled bays.

A great first step!