Car Park Charges to Rise in Gunnersbury Park
Fees set to double with payment app to be changed to RingGo
Gunnersbury Park car park
The management of Gunnersbury Park has announced that it intends to increase charges in its car park at the beginning of the New Year.
From January 2023 the current rate of 50p per hour, which was described as an introductory rate when introduced this May, doubles to £1.
For many regular park users the increase may be more than 100% as there was an option to pay 75p for a stay of up to 90 minutes and this will now cost £2.
Under the new charging regime, the first 30 minutes is free but the next half hour and ever hour after that costs £1. There appears to be no maximum stay.
It is unclear whether there will still be a 20-minute grace period before charges start to allow for drop offs/pick ups.
Blue badge holders will not be charged and can park in the disabled car park by the museum and the main car park.
Charges will apply at all times and will be enforced by ANPR cameras in the main car park.
The Y-Pay app that was initially in use for payments will be ditched when the new charges come into force. The management says that there were a high number of complaints about the system and from January the ‘tried and tested’ app from RingGo will be used. It is believed this will allow visitors to extend their stay in the park without returning to the machine which isn’t possible under the present system.
There will still be no facility for cash payments. The management say this is because of the extra risk of vandalism and theft and the cost of replacing damaged machines would reduce income from the car park. The museum and shop at Gunnersbury Park are also cashless.
100% of net income from the car park will be spent on maintaining the park and the museum and there is a target of £80,000 from car parking fees to spend on essential park maintenance. In the next financial year this will be spent on repairing pathways particularly in the south of the park. The most up-to-date estimate to repair pathways (obtained Spring 2022) costed repairs at £180 per linear metre of pathway.
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