City's two-hour free parking start date confirmed

Councillors last month agreed to scrap the charges at various car parks across Wakefield

A date has been confirmed for the re-introduction of two hours' free parking at council-run car parks across Wakefield.

Councillors last month agreed to scrap the charges at all its off-street car parks in Wakefield city centre, Castleford, Pontefract, Ossett, Normanton and South Elmsall in a bid to boost local businesses and encourage footfall.

Wakefield Council will now bring in the changes on 17 November, according to notices.

Councillor Matthew Morley told a cabinet meeting in September that the parking change was "massively needed".

"It's what people want. Residents want free car parking, visitors want free car parking," he said.

Previously, two hours of free parking had been put in place at off-street car parks across Wakefield at the start of the Covid pandemic in April 2020.

But charging was reintroduced in April 2023 to tackle a £24m budget shortfall because free parking was costing £1.8m a year in revenue, according to the Local Democracy Reporting Service.

Jack Hemingway, deputy leader of the council, said helping with parking would "enable our small businesses on the High Street to compete and for people to be able to shop local and stay in Wakefield and our towns".

Charges for people staying for longer than two hours will continue to apply.

People using country parks at Newmillerdam, Anglers and Pugneys will still be expected to pay for two-hour parking following the changes.

In July this year, the council also announced it had dropped plans to introduce Sunday parking charges.

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