There is nothing like an election to get issues moving that have previously been stalled.
This year we will shortly be having County Council elections and in his election address East Sussex County Council leader and local County Councillor Keith Glazier has promised to move the issue of Rye’s parking problems forward. Under the heading “Parking Solution for Rye and Villages Moves Forward”, his statement says: “Keith welcomes the recent announcement that County and Rother District Councils will work together to develop a business case for Civil Parking Enforcement in Rye and the surrounding areas. He readily recognises that, as a result of changes in policing priorities, there needs to be a solution found which satisfies the practical requirements of businesses, residents and visitors to our area.”
This is welcome news. Since the removal of a permanent police presence in the Town and the refusal of police, in any case, to control parking, the traffic situation has become progressively more chaotic. This paper has reported on a number of occasions the way in which illegal or selfish parking has restricted roads so that buses, emergency vehicles and other public utility vehicles are impeded and now, as our heading picture shows, even roads such as Conduit Hill – previously regarded as a ‘no go’ area for cars, is being used as a car park.
Other efforts have been made from time to time to control parking. Delivery vans in the High Street have always caused a problem and it was in an effort to deal with this that a loading bay was created outside The George. This has been largely ignored by local traders and their delivery companies and is now invariably occupied by cars.
A parking enforcement strategy will, we have been told, take up to two years to put in place, largely due to the bureaucratic procedure that it has to go through. This is not necessarily bad news as it will also give time for the Neighbourhood Plan – which outlines a number of proposals for general traffic control – to complete its own bureaucratic journey. If the will is there, this could then allow for a holistic plan to deal with all aspects of traffic and parking throughout the town, to be considered.
Photos: Rye News Library
