I decided to check out the Westminster Car Parks, what I found might shock you.

Off-topic
1

So I decided to try park my bike in a Westminster car park.

I entered Soho Car Park (China Town) with great anticipation…following the clear sign “Motorcycles this way” down down down I went all the way to the last floor must have been -3 level right in the darkest furthest away corner at the back of the underground car park, far away from the exit… what I found will shock you and I will be reporting this. Below are photos that I took on 26th January 2009 at around 8:30pm.

I spoke to the attendant at the reception, he said sorry… he was very apologetic and said he will be going down to investigate, I asked him… “Where can I park?” he said find a bay on-street…I said fine but I will have to report this. The sign clearly says " Solo Motorcycles AT ALL TIMES " There was NOT ONE space available for me… EVERY SINGLE SPACE in Soho Car Park had a CAR PARKED IN THE SOLO MOTORCYCLE BAY .

Feel free to use my images or go have a look for yourself and take your own photos… Westminster are charging us for this service??.. Are they having a fricking laugh… obviously they are.

Plus there were no signs stating the cost of the crappy space you had to pay for (like the small one they have on on-street bays), no instructions on how to pay, clearly this is wrong. Do the parking attendants (CEOs) not check the bays in the car parks? Obviously their machines do not work 3 levels down…

Also how do you expect a mobile phone to work -3 levels down in an underground car park, did this pass them by, are we expected to walk all the way from -3 level?

Westminster claim they are a model council… far from it, they said this parking charge would make it easier, safer and more convenient for us to park I can’t see where our money has gone, yet they have made £2million since the start of the parking experiment.

Object to this poor service which we are paying for, we deserve proper parking facilities !

– Here is my recent reply from Kevin Goad –

*Thank you for your e-mail and please accept my apologies. These bays are designated for motorcycles and should therefore have been protected. I have raised the matter formally with our car parks team and asked that they take appropriate action to protect the space at all times.

Regards

Kevin*

–

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2

not shocking really they always do that sainsburys near me they park in the bike bays and the ticket person there don’t do **** all. so i just take up a hole car space for my bike :smiley:

3

im surprised they didnt clamp the cars… surely they would get even more money that way???
:wink:

4

Is the motorcycle parking in your sainsburys car park free? Because parking in the Soho Car park is not as you know… You pay Westminster money, you expect to get a space without a car in it. Plus you cannot park in a car bay in Westminster Car parks.

It is unacceptable.

5

Just out of curiosity, does your phone work down there?

Reason being, is that you could get a ticket by the time you surface. i asked a traffic warden in town, ‘how long do I have to get change?’ he said ‘none, unless you’re a commercial vehicle, then I’ll give you 5mins or so.’

Also, I thought that by paying to park, you were entering a contract (see thread on rogue parking attendants), and that the fee had to be displayed?

So there you have it… See You Next Tuesday.

:angry:

6

I would be suprised if parking attendants terminal would work down there, so they can probably not check anyway.

7

The simple answer is that they’re likely to earn more from the Car about £24 a day rather than 8 bikes… so they have no reason to care. What they should do is place a single bollard in the entrance to the space.

8

PLUS the clamp/ticket fee.

9

You have nice clear images with number plates showing plus the detail of the signage.

Print off good copies and send them to Westminsters Chief Executive under the Freedom of Information Act asking what enforcement action eas taken against these vehicles after you reported the infringement to the attendant.

After a few people have done this, they might start to take notice.

It’ll still be a crappy place to park but if they are going to charge, they might yet learn to give a service.

10

email reply from Kevin Goad

Thank you for your e-mail and please accept my apologies. These bays are designated for motorcycles and should therefore have been protected. I have raised the matter formally with our car parks team and asked that they take appropriate action to protect the space at all times.

Regards

Kevin

Guess a few guy’s got their nuts chewed over this :smiley:

11

Way to go. Keep at it.