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Drivers’ £4.87m to park in Southend

motorists are paying £4.87million a year to park in Southend, the Echo can reveal.

Figures, released under Freedom of Information laws, show charges for on-street spaces and council-owned car parks raked in more than £41million over the past decade.

The stats put the council way ahead of its counterparts in south Essex, with BasildonCouncil taking just over £1million and Castle Point Council only taking £723,300 in 2009/10.

In contrast, finance chiefs in Southend received £4.87million over the same period, an annual windfall which has risen every year since 2001.

Iain Daggerson, 43, commutes from his home in Eastwood Road, Rayleigh, to Southend and pays for parking his car on the street every weekday.

He said: “I know it costs me a lot of money, but I never really realised how much it was until it’s added up like that. It’s an outrageous sum when you think about it.

“I’ve got to question whether the council needs to bring in all that money through parking.

“Drivers have it bad enough already with the price of fuel. They could do without this as well.”

Councils are allowed to charge a “reasonable” rate for car parking, which is designed to cover the wages of traffic wardens and admin costs.

Under Audit Commission rules, councils can keep surplus profits, but they must spend it on transport projects unless they have been been rated “excellent” by inspectors.

None of the councils in south Essex were graded “excellent” in their latest examinations.

In total, after costs, south Essex councils made a profit of £4.74million in 2009/10, with the money from Southend motorists making up the bulk of that figure, nearly £3.2million.

Southend was also the only council which increased its profit from parking charges between 2008/09 and 2009/10, the latest available statistics.

Motorists in the town swelled the council’s bank account by an extra £500,000.

Andrew Lewis, Southend Council’s corporate director for enterprise, tourism and the environment, said: “Managing and maintaining public car parks and parking spaces is an expensive undertaking and car parking income helps to support this.

“Any surplus in on-street car parking income is, by law, used to make good any deficits, to meet all or part of the cost of providing and maintaining off-street parking.

“It can also be put towards public passenger transport and environmental improvement, support the council’s wider maintenance of, and investment in, the local highway, cycleway and footway networks.”