Trade is down due to parking fees, businesses say

Businesses in a town centre have said they are losing trade after a council started charging for parking.

North Somerset Council introduced charges to Nailsea's Station Road car park last year but businesses now want the authority to cancel them.

At the time, the council said the fees were "unavoidable" due to its financial position. It is charging £1 for an hour and £3.50 for a day.

Emma Lake, who runs pub-bistro Coates House, told the council in a meeting: "It does feel like North Somerset Council do not want small independent businesses to survive."

Lake said the business has had to cut its hours, after the number of customers coming in for lunch dropped by half.

The publican said its busiest times have changed from lunchtimes, Fridays and Saturdays, to evenings and Sundays – the only times when car parking remains free.

The new pattern was not enough to compensate for the loss in trade, she told a council meeting to review the parking charges.

"It's Nailsea. It's not a destination place. It's not a place where you come and spend a day," she told the Local Democracy Reporting Service.

"So anything that helps people come to Nailsea and spend in the local community is going to help massively."

Nailsea Town Council carried out a survey and said 79% of businesses that responded had reported their turnover being adversely affected by parking fees.

The results were submitted to North Somerset Council, along with a warning that the impact on local businesses was a "serious economic concern".

North Somerset Council officers said the relationship between parking charges and the health of the high street was "more complex".

The owners of newsagent May News on Somerset Square are now planning to sell the shop if profits don't improve.

Ryan Higgs, who works at the newsagent, said: "Ever since the parking charges came in, our business has been slowly dropping."

The shop's customers were mostly older, he said, and did not want to pay the parking charges. They are also less able to walk in to town from home.

He said: "The parking charges are ruining a lot of shops. I have never seen this town centre as dead and as quiet and depressing as it is now."

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