Dorset: New parking meters to replace old, broken machines

The council says the roll out of the new machines will take around 18 months to complete

A roll out of new parking meters will replace hundreds of old and broken machines that have lost a council revenue in recent years.

Dozens of meters have been out of order according to Dorset Council and will be replaced over the next six months.

The council did not reveal how much money it had lost or the replacement costs.

It said the new machines would be simple to use and allow customers to pay with either cash or a card.

Highways director Matthew Piles said that 60 machines would be rolled out over the coming months with another 200 or more after that.

Mr Piles told councillors the authority had been coping with a range of different machines, many of them old and difficult to get spare parts for, since the unitary council was created in the spring of 2019.

"In one case we have five different machines in just one car park," he told an audit and governance committee meeting.

Although the council does use a "parking app" many places did not have enough signal for it to work and many people did not have smart phones, according to the Local Democracy Reporting Service.

Dozens of parking payment machines across Dorset are currently out of order, reducing council revenue

The council said: "The roll out of the machines will start shortly and is expected to take 18 months to fully complete.

"We have seen a large move towards app payment and card payment in the last few years.

"To ensure that this can be achieved easily we will be looking at signal quality in the car parks, improving this with boosters when required."

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