Derek Deedman

At the Steyning Parish Council meeting last night a senior Horsham District Council officer outlined the current position on the car parks in the Town.

High Street

It has been agreed after months of negotiations that the fenced-off wall will be reconstructed by the District Council, with future maintenance of the wall being the responsibility of the neighbouring owners.

It is expected that the arrangements for carrying out the work will take a few months so that the reconstruction work will not be fully completed until mid-2008. In the circumstances the District Council will investigate painting temporary chevron white lines next to the fence to gain as many parking spaces as possible.

Fletchers Croft

The temporary spaces alongside the entrance road will be repaired by the District Council with the costs shared with the Primary Care Trust. The District Council may also consider making the spaces permanent after the temporary Health Centre has been closed to give more car parking spaces at the car park.

Newmans Gardens

With the new Health Centre under construction and the works related to the new Care Home about to start it is likely that there will be a period when use of the car park will be further disrupted in the early part of 2008.

Part of the car park (ten spaces) will be used for parking at the site offices for the Care Home contractors and more of the remaining 4 hour waiting spaces will be converted to 24 hour parking. This will provide more long-term parking spaces for both workers in the Town and the workers at the two construction sites whilst the Health Centre and Care Home are being built.

The District Council says it is committed to improving communications with local people on what is happening at the car park over the coming months.

The Parish Council has asked the District Council for greater enforcement, by the car parking wardens, of the yellow no parking lines in the High Street. This is to prevent even more cars displaced from the car parks clogging up the High Street.

Action is being taken to further increase the number of car parking spaces in Steyning with a new car park next to the Library for the School during school hours and the community the rest of the time. In addition the District Council is being pressed to reorganise the Newmans Gardens car park to provide more spaces once the construction works are completed. However, in the long term, we cannot expect to cope with ever increasing car traffic, and much more must be done to increase the number of cycleways/footpaths and public transport to encourage people out of their cars when travelling to Steyning.