No more rooting around for change - new pay and display machines set for Warwickshire's country parks

Visitors to Warwickshire’s country parks will soon be able to pay for their parking without having to search for the correct change
Ryton Pools. Photo: Google Streetview.Ryton Pools. Photo: Google Streetview.
Ryton Pools. Photo: Google Streetview.

And county council plans to install card payment machines at its eight parks and greenways should, according to a report, reduce theft and reduce queues.

Warwickshire County Council leader Cllr Izzi Seccombe approved the £130,000 funding under delegated powers and it is hoped that the first of the new pay and display machines could be installed within a matter of weeks.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

A report by strategy and commissioning manager Vicki Barnard explained that the majority of the car parks currently used a cash only system.

She explained: “This approach has been in need of updating to meet changing visitor needs, particularly the desire to pay by card, and this need has been made urgent by the Covid-19 crisis where cash-based solutions present an increased transmission risk for visitors and staff.

“Further reasons to move away from cash include the continued incidence of thefts and damage, and the queues caused at some locations where cash-based barriers require exact change.

“We therefore propose the installation of card-based payment machines at all our car parks, to replace the existing cash machines.”

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

She added that 75 per cent of car park revenue came from two county council sites - Kingsbury Water Park and Ryton Pools - and that more advanced systems would be installed at those in time which would allow features such as free short visits to drop off/pick up, the purchase and use of annual permits and optional use of barriers to manage numbers.

The report explained that when the existing machines were targeted by thieves, it typically led to a new machine being purchased and commissioned at a cost of up to £5,000.

It also meant no parking fees were collected for up to four weeks.

It went on: “To solve the most pressing problem of needing to eliminate cash from our parking transactions, ten standalone card-based pay-and-display machines will be purchased immediately. These are of the same specification as machines recently trialled with success at Burton Dassett [near Warwick] and Seven Meadows [Stratford].

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

“Initially, these will be installed at the sites where cashless payments are currently not possible: Pooley, Hartshill, Ryton and Kingsbury.

“We are informed that the supplier has these in stock, and so estimate that these machines can be operational within two to three weeks of approval of this expenditure.”