Future Services Consultation 2024 - Rural Countryside Car Parking Proposal

Insight Summary

Background

From 8 January to 31 March 2024, Hampshire County Council (HCC) invited residents, partners, and stakeholders to provide their views on options to change and reduce some local services to help the Authority address a £132 million budget shortfall faced by April 2025.

One of the options proposed was to introduce car parking charges at the rural countryside car parks that HCC manage, where doing so would be commercially viable (i.e. the income raised would cover the costs of implementation). It is anticipated that this could raise around £65,000 each year, going some way to covering the costs of providing and maintaining countryside car parks.

Two separate proposals were considered:

Proposal 1: Charges for rural countryside car parks with 20 or more spaces, Ten specific car parks were listed where the proposal could be implemented
Proposal 2: Charges for rural countryside car parks with fewer than 20 spaces, or which are in joint ownership with other organisations. No specific car parks were mentioned as part of this proposal

Who responded to these proposals?

A third of those responding to the Future Services consultation overall elected to respond on rural car parking, generating just over 4,500 responses
4,459 responses came from individuals, 39 from organisations, and a further 33 from democratically elected representatives

The organisations responding were chiefly made up of charity, voluntary or local community groups (17 responses), and local authorities (10 responses)

Respondents were invited to add further comments to support their views on the proposals via open-ended questions. These allowed people to expand on impacts they felt the proposed changes would cause and suggest alternative courses of action

Of all those responding on rural car parking, just over a third (1,505 people) chose to provide open-ended comments
In addition, 77 respondents commented on rural car parking via a further, general, open-ended question for any other feedback at the end of the consultation

A further 37 unstructured responses (letters / emails) were also received including comments relating specifically to the rural countryside car parking proposal were also received. Of these:

17 were from organisations
15 were from individuals
5 were from democratically elected representatives

These responses reflected the same themes seen from those who completed the consultation response form.

In order to help capture the views of young people about the consultation, members of the Hampshire Youth Forum (aged between 11 and 18) were invited to consider the proposals and attend a discussion group to share their feedback

Countryside and rural countryside car park users were heavily represented in the responses to the rural carparking proposals:

The vast majority of responses to this proposal (3,739) were from people who visit the Hampshire countryside at least once a year

Many were even more frequent visitors: approximately three quarters of respondents (3,182) visit at least once a month, and just under half (2,012) visit at least weekly. Responses also included a number of daily visitors (739).
Respondents mainly visit the countryside sites to walk, followed by dog walking

Over half of the responses (2,191) were from people who visit one or more of the ten specific sites which could potentially be impacted. This means that at least 300 responses were given to these proposals from users of each site (rising to as many as 760 for some):

The most commonly visited by the consultation respondents were Fort Nelson (Portchester), Crabwood / Farley Mount (Winchester) and Hyde Common (New Forest)
The least visited were Martin Down (Fordingbridge) and Silchester (Tadley)

Responses also reflected groups with other characteristics:

Responses to these proposals came from all districts in Hampshire, with a higher proportion from East Hampshire (604), New Forest (540), and Winchester (457)

The lowest level of responses were from Gosport, Hart, Havant and Rushmoor (between 118 and 158 each)

Notably more females (2,279) responded than did males (1,738) or those of non-binary gender (21)
Almost half the individual responses (1,985) were from those aged 45 to 64, with approximately a further third (1,351) from those aged 65 or over. Just under a fifth of respondents (819) were under the age of 45, of whom just 41 were aged under 25
Almost a quarter of respondents (1,094) had children or young people up to the age of 18 in the household
The majority of respondents (3,216) were not affected by health or disability, but a quarter were either were limited in their activities either a little (582) or a lot (248)
316 individuals from ethnic minority groups responded – nearly half (45%) of these were from white backgrounds other than English, Welsh, Scottish, Northern Irish or British. The remainder was made up of smaller groups from other ethnic backgrounds, most notably Mixed or multiple ethnic groups, Asian or Asian British groups, or those describing themselves as of ‘other’ ethnic backgrounds
Nearly three fifths of the respondents to this proposal (2,672) chose to disclose their annual household income. Of those that did, nearly half were receiving between £20,000 and £60,000 per annum, and about a further two fifths had incomes higher than £60,000. Only just over one in ten of those stating their income were earning less than £20,000 a year

Please note that this was an open consultation the respondents were self-selecting so do not provide a representative sample of the total Hampshire population.

Levels of agreement with these proposals

There was a spread of opinion towards the two options in this proposal, although for both, more people overall were in favour of the charges than against.

Proposal 1: For the specified ten car parks with over 20 spaces there was a clear majority in favour: over half of the respondents (53%) agreed with the proposal to introduce charges.
Proposal 2: In the case of the second proposal (charges in car parks with less than 20 spaces or jointly owned with another organisation), the difference, while still notable, was much smaller (45% agree / 42% disagree).
For both proposals, the remaining 13% were uncommitted (neither agreeing nor disagreeing).

However, of those people agreeing with the proposals, agreement was generally milder (more often ‘agree’ than ‘agree strongly’), especially for Proposal 2:

Proposal 1: 32% ‘agree’, 21% ‘agree strongly’
Proposal 2: 29% ‘agree’, 15% ‘agree strongly’

For the people agreeing strongly, it was very clear from their comments that support was driven by feelings that car parking charges were normal in other places, that the Council should be charging for non-essential services, and that the money would allow investment back into the rural areas. There was also a sense that charging for these car parks would be better than withdrawing funding from other services, and that the impact of this proposal would fall more on people who could afford, or choose, to pay.

“We are all used to hardly anywhere being free parking now. It is better to pay for parking rather than take away other services.”

“Charging is fair, these places need to be maintained that is not cheap. Better off people tend to use them.”

However, for the greater proportion of supporters of each proposal who agreed, but less strongly, their more muted support often contained caveats to their views:

Agreement, but tempered with observations on the impact (e.g. to those on lower incomes or with disabilities) and suggestions for mitigation for these groups (e.g. exemption for Blue Badge holders)
Agreement, but tempered with stipulation around the proposed charges (e.g. the money should be used for reinvestment in the countryside, the quality and safety of the car parks should be maintained, the Council should ensure the charges are reasonable)
Reluctant agreement that charges for car parking were a less bad option than other service reduction (e.g. for vulnerable residents in Hampshire)

“If it has to be, then so be it. It may discourage some users, of course, so the costs need to be reasonable, & the car parks need to provide a service in return, so security of some sort & a reasonable surface to park on.”

There were however also those who disagreed with the proposals:

Key reasons for disagreement were predominantly driven by a mix of general negative comments around charging, and more specific impacts:

General negative comments: creating financial barriers to access to the countryside (when the Council should be encouraging use), fear about high charges, concerns about costs exceeding revenue, and importance of the countryside generally

“I think with the cost of living issues currently being faced by people, a walk in the fresh air with children or dogs is one of the few things that can be done on a lower budget/free, introduce car parking and that limits peoples’ access”

“The world is an angry place because we are stacked up on one another with no gardens, no green spaces and less and less disposable income so now this wonderful county is trying to make it harder for people to enjoy the countryside.”

“Short sighted option. You will just push visitors to other car parks that don't charge. The cost to set this up and manage it means you are dreaming if you think you'll generate £65K profit.”

Impacts: these are detailed more fully further on in this report, but primarily focused on the negative effects of inappropriate parking elsewhere, impact to groups of car park users (e.g. families) and health impacts of reduced countryside access.

"You will simply end up with verge parking so damaging fragile areas of the Forest (Hyde and Abbotswell). No-one will pay if they can park elsewhere. Why these carparks which affect locals every day but not touristy carparks? An hour isn’t long."

Unlike agreement, which was typically expressed with less strength of feeling, those who were opposed to either proposal tended to be more strongly against the idea (more ‘disagreeing strongly’ than ‘disagreeing’)

Proposal 1: 12% disagree, 21% disagree strongly
Proposal 2: 17% disagree, 25% disagree strongly

Also, for both proposals, there was much greater opposition from frequent countryside visitors, and in the case of Proposal 2 this opposition was particularly strong. Current users of the sites specified in Proposal 1 were also more notably opposed than average
Opposition to both proposals was especially strong in the New Forest, and amongst users of Martin Down Nature Reserve and Hyde Common

Response amongst service users

Despite overall support for both proposals, those disagreeing with them were more typically service users:

Users of any of the sites where changes are proposed:

Proposal 1: still overall in favour but by a lower margin (50% agree / 39% disagree)
Proposal 2: more opposed than in favour, with notably fewer in agreement than average (42% agree / 46% disagree)

Visitors of specific sites potentially impacted: greater opposition than support from users of some specific sites, more so for Proposal 2 than Proposal 1.

Proposal 1:

Martin Down Nature Reserve, Fordingbridge (30% agree / 62% disagree)
Hyde Common, New Forest (36% agree / 53% disagree)

Proposal 2:

Martin Down (25% agree / 67% disagree)
Hyde Common (30% agree / 60% disagree)
Hook with Warsash Nature Reserve (40% agree / 50% disagree)
Danebury Iron Age Hillfort (39% agree / 48% disagree)
Silchester Roman Town (43% agree / 47% disagree)
Overall views of visitors to other sites were less polarised, with levels of agreement and disagreement about the same as each other.

Users of Hyde Common

Not only were users of Hyde Common amongst those most strongly in opposition to parking charges proposals, they were more likely to comment on the proposals, indicating the strength of feeling on this site in particular, and making them a very vocal group in the overall open-ended responses (23% of which came specifically from them)
Comments specific to this site revolved around inappropriate alternative parking damaging the environment (verges, biodiversity) and inconveniencing the local community generally, but also highlighted impact on the car park users. This mainly included Hyde school staff who would be required to pay to park for work, but also mentioned cricket club and recreation ground users
Negative impacts of charges at the Abbotts Well Road car park were very frequently also mentioned alongside Hyde School car park, especially by users of Hyde Common

"Both have poor quality surfaces, which would surely need to be improved if users are expected to pay, and are busy and popular. One doubles as the car park for the local school and cricket club. I believe charges will drive visitors to park on verges which is both environmentally bad in the Forest and potentially dangerous on narrow roads.”

"This would severely and unfairly impact staff at Hyde school as well as the parents, cricket team and players and public using this space for recreation. A totally unfair proposal when many other car parks in the New Forest would continue to be free”.

Frequent visitors to rural countryside sites: There was an inverse relationship between frequency of visiting and support for the proposals - the more frequently someone visited any of the rural carparks, the more they disagreed. Again, opinion was even stronger in the case of Proposal 2.

Daily visitors: Over half (53%) disagreed with Proposal 1 and over three fifths (63%) disagreed with Proposal 2 – in both cases disagreement was mainly strongly expressed
Weekly visitors were slightly less strongly opposed
Only when visiting levels dropped below weekly did agreement outweigh disagreement for either proposal, with those not visiting at all the most in favour of the proposed charges (73% agreeing with Proposal 1, 65% agreeing with Proposal 2)

"I think introducing further car parking will adversely affect peoples’ enjoyment and mental wellbeing. We would certainly not be able to afford to take daily walks if we had to pay. £3 per day doesn't sound like much but it equates to £1095 a year."

Dog walkers: Potentially linked to frequency of use, those who used the countryside areas mainly for dog walking were less likely to be supportive of the proposals

Proposal 1: Balance of opinion was still supportive (51% agree / 37% disagree), but notably less so than average, and strength of opinion was much stronger for those in opposition than those in favour
Proposal 2: Balance of opinion was equal (44% agree / 45% disagree), but again with stronger feeling from those opposed to the proposal

Response amongst other groups

People living in the New Forest / very rural areas: Potentially linked to the views on Martin Down and Hyde School, people living in the New Forest, and in very rural areas, were notably more likely to disagree with both proposals (again, especially Proposal 2), with more strength of feeling from those disagreeing than those agreeing:

New Forest dwellers:

Proposal 1: 43% agree / 47% disagree
Proposal 2: 34% agree / 57% disagree

Those in very rural hamlets and isolated dwellings (Identified from respondent’s postcode and classified according to the Office of National Statistics rural classification index):

Proposal 1: 42% agree / 48% disagree
Proposal 2: 35% agree / 55% disagree

“Charging for parking will cause parking on verges and other places in the new forest leading to an erosion of the environment and is dangerous for the animals. Using the car park makes sense and should remain free.”

People living in areas other than the New Forest

In addition to those living in the New Forest, disagreement with the proposals was notably higher than average from those in Fareham: not enough to outweigh agreement on Proposal 1, but enough to equal it for Proposal 2
On the other hand, people in Winchester, Havant, Gosport, and Basingstoke and Deane were more likely to support both proposals than average.

People on lower annual incomes: Although support still outweighed disagreement, a second inverse relationship was evident between salary and support for the proposal: the lower the income, the higher the disagreement with the proposed charges

Age differences: Support for the proposal lessened the older the respondent – although disagreement did not necessarily increase correspondingly. Consequently a much greater proportion of those aged over 45 and over 65 were likely to say they neither agreed nor disagreed

Like many residents of the area I’m retired, old, not wealthy, but enjoy occasional parking on the cliff top for short periods of time. The car parking is too expensive so we park on Marine Drive. Just long enough to go for a short walk or maybe sit on a bench and enjoy the views. I’m sure there are many other local people who feel the same way, so please don’t change things and price us out of this little enjoyment at our time of life.”

Those with children in the household were typically more supportive of the proposal overall than those without. There is no clear evidence from the data as to why this is, although it may be that it is linked with other factors such as age, income, location, or levels of service use.

Environmental impact

Over a third of respondents (37%) identified the environmental impact of the proposals, and those who went on to give comments spoke about the effect on wildlife, and the impact of parking elsewhere on both local communities and the environment (e.g. road safety, blocked lanes, damage to verges).

The issue of environmental impact was particularly evident for the following groups:

Service users (especially frequent ones) and those who visit any of the sites potentially impacted
Those who mainly use the countryside for observing birds or nature
Those living in the New Forest

“This will lead to more parking in unofficial sites / places on predominantly narrow roads. Evidence locally demonstrates this causes damage to roadside plants, hedges, road surfaces and pathways. It also creates dangerous driving / walking conditions in rural places that often lack pathways.”

Impact related to protected characteristics

People responding to the proposed changes were most likely to indicate that the withdrawal of the funding would impact people because of rurality (40%), poverty (36%), age (32%), or disability (30%).

"Charging pushes people to look for free areas even if this is a passing layby in a lane, Lockdown showed this. … Makes it a nightmare for those of us that work in the countryside with large machinery. Frequently have our farm gates blocked. The village gets grid locked … usually by people outside the area and then villagers can't park to get to church.”

"Access to the countryside is so important for wellbeing that the cost of parking should not be a barrier. This will disproportionately affect the poor."

There were some differences depending on the respondent’s characteristics themselves:

Older respondents and those with health or disability limitations themselves were more likely to flag that age or disability was a concern
More frequent visitors to the countryside, and to the specific sites were more likely to cite rurality
Those agreeing with the proposals were less likely than average to feel they had a poverty impact.

Other impacts identified:

Around 15% of respondents to these proposals (737 people in total) also identified potential impacts via the open-ended comments.

The most mentioned themes emphasised the impacts already outlined above:

Impact on the environment and local communities: impact of inappropriate parking elsewhere (45%), negative impact on wildlife or diversity (6%)
Impact on people related to protected characteristics (33%) – specifically poverty (10%) or rurality (6%)
Health impacts – the consequence of a reduction in exercise and access to open spaces on physical and mental well-being (22%), and some consequent impact on health services (4%)
Impact on specified groups of car park users (21%) - e.g. families, parents taking children to school particularly in the New Forest / users of Hyde Common, dog walkers and commuters.
Reduction on level of site usage (19%)
Impact on personal finances due to cost of parking (13%)
Road safety concerns (9%)
Other mentions were small, but included economic impact (cost of implementation outweighing benefit, impact of reduced visitors on the local economy), positive effect on the countryside (creating investment in sites), and impacts on vehicle usage (chiefly people driving further to visit free sites)

“Walking is encouraged to promote health and well-being. By introducing charges, you will deter people from getting out into the countryside, especially those of limited means and those with strains on finances, including families with young children, who need exercise and mental stimulation.”

The Hampshire Youth Forum feedback also centred on the impact of people parking illegally, with concern of the cost of implementing the charges and potential negative impact of tourism. However, they also identified a potential impact on younger people moving out of the areas affected, with consequent knock-on effects on the age profile and economic prosperity of those regions.

Pricing

Response to questions on potential parking prices suggests that while the principle of parking charges may be acceptable to many, there may be some resistance to the amounts potentially involved – especially from service users and those opposed to the proposals.

People do not want to be charged for the first hour. Universally, people felt that short stays of up to an hour should be free: a majority of 79% supported free parking for short stays, with only a minority of 14% opposed (and a further 7% unsure).

Amongst some groups there was slightly less opposition to potential charges for the first hour, but this was still a minority view:

Support for charging for short stays of up to an hour rose to 20% from those in Winchester
Support for charging for short stays rose to 23% amongst those who agreed with the rural car parking proposals overall
People do not want to pay as much as £3 for 2 hours. Asked whether a charge of £3 for a stay of up to two hours at countryside sites was appropriate, a majority (57%) said it was too much, with a further 37% saying it was about right. Only 4% were unsure and 1% felt it was too low.

Amongst daily users of rural countryside parking, the percentage of those saying it was too high rose to 70%.
Over 80% of those who disagreed with the proposals said a £3 charge was too high.
While only a very small proportion of overall responses (14), charities or voluntary / local community groups were also particularly likely to say £3 was too much.
The average amount felt to be appropriate for a 2 hour stay was £1.83. However, this varied by district from around £1.50 (New Forest) to around £2.40 (Basingstoke and Deane), with most other districts falling between £1.80 and £2.10. <

“£3 for 2 hours is ludicrous, especially considering the absolute state of some of these car parks. Not to mention they're unsafe after dark. Made out of mud, potholes everywhere and huge puddles in winter. Not to mention the lack of bins. Free hour then £1 for 2 hours is far more reasonable. £3 is just pure greed on the council’s behalf.”

(Respondents were asked how they felt about a proposed £3 charge for a 2 hour stay at a rural countryside car park. Where they responded that it was "too low" or "too high" they were asked to suggest an appropriate amount. For those who responded that £3 was "about right" £3 was used as an 'appropriate amount' in their view. The analysis then took an average of all these suggested amounts.)

Linking with views on the pricing, people disagreeing with the proposal (both via the response form and in some of the unstructured responses received by letter / email) suggest that the price of implementing car parking charges is likely to exceed the revenue gained by them, especially if the consequent cost of verge repairs and maintenance is taken into consideration.

“It is a criminal offence to park on the verges in the New Forest and introducing parking fees will only encourage visitors from outside the forest to park illegally. These laws are currently never enforced and I cannot see the local authorities funding the policing/parking attendants to enforce an increase in parking violations as a result of charges being introduced, it would defeat the object of introducing the charges in the first place.”

What do people believe we should be doing differently?

Just under one in ten people responding about rural car parks offered suggestions on the topic (418 in total). Most of these were about ways in which the proposal could or should be implemented rather than alternative courses of action, but some related to finding additional funding.

Find alternative sources of funding (11%) – mostly such comments related to increasing revenue at sites by raising or introducing other charges or services. Suggestions were varied with no clear single recommendation emerging - e.g. donation schemes / honesty boxes, raise prices for car parking at larger sites such as Country Parks, charges for overnight motorhome parking, charges for activities such as guided walks, renting car parking pitches to coffee or food vendors, charges for commercial dog-walking, charges for site amenities such as BBQ or toilet usage. There were also some low levels of accompanying suggestions around introducing fines – both to generate income, but also to control the adverse impact of the proposed changes

“Commercial dog walkers should also be required to purchase annual permits to use County Council car parks - after all, they are making money from using these facilities and could pass the costs on to customers”

"Lease out the Hampshire Country Parks. This will reduce the staffing costs, reduce HCC liability and insurance costs, and will result in a fixed annual receipt.”

“I live in [redacted] and visitors don’t use the free car parking already but instead have destroyed verges and park dangerously on sharp bends. Why not fine these drivers to raise funds? I would volunteer my time locally to issue warnings and or fines.”

“Could the council rent pitches in these car parks to food and/or drink vendors?”

Make changes to other budgets (7%). Typically this was about reducing spend on other council costs and services - suggestions here largely referred to Hampshire County Council salaries, expenses, and perception of wasted or inefficient spend elsewhere

“Again, £65,000 is a drop in the ocean. I'm sure the salaries of your executives could be cut - or even culled to raise this amount.”

The suggestions about how the proposals could be implemented typically fell into the following categories:

Suggestions about payment mechanisms (26%) – predominantly requesting that ‘smart’ payment systems be avoided

“Any payment system must also allow for the mobile phone needed and those that don’t have tech”

Suggestions for differential rates:

cheaper rates for frequent users (16%) – chiefly season-tickets
exemptions (13%) e.g. for Blue Badge holders, or for local residents
higher tariffs for some users (4%) e.g. business users, larger vehicles

Suggestions around charges for different lengths of stay:

Charging for short stays (5%)
A charging structure to encourage longer stays (4%) – e.g. for hikers or days out

21% of those making suggestions also noted that car parks needed to be better maintained or improved, or that better access to them via public transport was needed

"The carparks provide a vital lifeline for people to be able to escape from the towns and cities, an affordable annual parking ticket would work better for those regularly visiting the carparks, an hour or 2 hours is not long enough for meaningful exercise to take place."

"People are generally ok with parking charges, assuming they are fair and reasonable, can be paid easily, i.e. doesn't require fifteen minutes setting it up over the phone, and the car park is well maintained."

The Hampshire Youth Forum additionally noted that Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR) might be good way of implementing the proposal, keeping charging simple for visitors, resulting potentially in lower implementation costs (seen as cheaper than enforcement officer costs), and potentially giving greater feelings of safety at the sites themselves (cameras in situ).

Specific offers to work with HCC around rural countryside car parking

Apart from one individual who said they would happily deploy fine notices to cars parked inappropriately locally, there were no comments or offers from individuals or organisations to run rural car parking.
However, Forestry England have expressed a desire to work together to create a joint strategy for car park charging across Hampshire.

Additionally, there were suggestions from a few respondents about other areas that Hampshire could learn from:

Positive examples:

Dorset (but no specifics stated)
Midhurst (charges are lower)
Alton and Petersfield (charge in the same way in other villages, but allow the first hour free)
Andover (£1 for up to two hours)
Petersfield (£1.80 for up to two hours)
Bishop’s Waltham (short stay is free)
Buckinghamshire Country Parks (£3.50 for unlimited time)
Waverley Borough Council (no charge for local disabled permit holders)
Areas where motorhomes are charged for overnight stays (e.g. Torridge, Pembrokeshire)
Further afield in Europe (no charges for attractions and nature parks)

A negative example was also cited in terms of Surrey where car parking charges were not perceived as having been successful (but no further detail given)
There were also two suggestions about outsourcing car parking to a third party to manage, or to local and parish councils.

Comments on the consultation

Councillor for Fareham and Warsash raised challenges around the Hook Barn criteria for inclusion (believes the size and shape fails the ‘20 car’ test)
Amongst the unstructured responses there was also mention from Hyde Cricket Club that the land, including the car park rights, is subject to a lease to the cricket club

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