Exclusive: City street tops poll of parking ticket hot-spots

Clarendon Road in Little Woodhouse, which runs from near the General Infirmary up past the university, has topped a region-wide poll of parking ticket hot-spots with more than 3,000 fines issued last year.

Leeds City Council, which hands out around a third of all the parking tickets in Yorkshire, said: "Clarendon Road stretches through a busy residential area, borders the universities and hospital and is within walking distance of the city centre.

"As a result, it is not surprising that a lot of motorists attempt to get away with parking illegally. However, they are inevitability seen and tickets issued."

Ecclesall Road in Sheffield was third on the list of traffic warden favourites, with the highest number of fines handed out anywhere outside of Leeds. The 2,790 tickets issued there last year was double the number handed out the year before.

The council pointed to the establishment of a new permit parking zone along part of the route as one reason for the large increase.

Cabinet member for parking Coun Ian Auckland said: "Ecclesall Road is one of our main arterial routes into the city and it happens to run through the (newly-established) Sharrow Vale Permit Parking Zone.

"As a popular centre for shopping and night-life, it is also one of the busiest for pay and display parking in the city, which needs regular monitoring to make it work."

Sheffield's vast overall rise in parking tickets last year – up 30 per cent on its 2007/08 total – was in marked contrast to another urban authority, York City Council, which said it had introduced new systems in a bid to bring the number of parking fines down.

Policies such as no longer handing out tickets for being parked slightly outside of a bay, and the introduction of pay-by-mobile-phone parking schemes, saw tickets reduced by more than 20 per cent last year.

A York Council spokeswoman said: "Our objective is to try to achieve 100 per cent compliance with parking regulations. A decrease in PCNs (parking fines) is one indicator of better compliance – but... there are several other factors in York.

"To keep the traffic flowing, more emphasis has been placed on street enforcement rather than car parks. PCNs are no longer issued for minor contraventions, such as being parked slightly outside a parking bay. (And) the introduction of a pay to park by phone facility has resulted in the reduction in PCNs where pay and display tickets have expired."

Tourists arriving in the city by car should still beware, however – motorists using the Castle car park on Tower Street in York are more likely to get a ticket than at any other car park in the region.

The spokeswoman said: "The Castle car park is very popular and one of the busiest and one of the most central to a number of tourist attractions.

"Over 30,000 motorists use it each month, and the number of PCNs issued really reflects its use and the overstays/incorrect payments by some motorists."

Despite popular mythology, not one council in the region said it offered financial incentives to its traffic wardens for issuing tickets – though Hull Council said it could not confirm what its traffic wardens are paid, as it sub-contracts the work to a private firm.

Overall, our study shows that councils issued 410,209 parking tickets across the region in 2008/09, a 2.5 per cent increase on the previous year.

A total of 10,658,438 was brought in to local authority coffers through fines – but documents show millions more have gone uncollected over the past few years.

Sheffield City Council has written off almost 1m in uncollected fines since 2005, while Leeds City Council is owed 5.4m over the same period.

A spokesman for Leeds said the city council's overall collection rate was above the national average of around 75 per cent, however.

"All tickets are subject to a robust recovery process – including referral to bailiff – and we will always collect as many outstanding fines as possible," he said.

PARK AND RILE

Yorkshire councils parking ticket league table 2008/09

1. Leeds – 127,137 tickets (down two per cent from 2007/08)

2. Sheffield – 60,667 (up 29 per cent)

3. Kirklees – 34,204 (down three per cent)

4. Hull – 24,708 (down 16 per cent)

5. Scarborough – 22,413 (07/08 data not comparable)

6. Wakefield – 19,503 (down seven per cent)

7. Harrogate – 18,677 (up three per cent)

8. York – 16,717 (down 21 per cent)

9. Calderdale – 15,998 (down 14 per cent)

10. Doncaster – 14,457 (down 10 per cent)

11. Rotherham – 11,283 (up 16 per cent)

12. Barnsley - 10,795 (down less than 1 per cent)

Areas where on-street parking rules enforced by police not included

Yorkshire's nine parking hot-spots (most parking tickets issued, 2008/09)

1. Clarendon Road, Leeds – 3,003

2. Cookridge Street, Leeds – 2,842

3. Ecclesall Road, Sheffield – 2,790

4. Great George Street, Leeds – 2,654

5. Norfolk Street, Sheffield – 2,056

6. Castle car park, York – 1,817

7. Thoresby Place, Leeds – 1,730

8. Park Place, Leeds – 1,728

9. Surrey Street, Sheffield – 1,691

TICKET HOT-SPOTS BY LOCAL AUTHORITY AREA

Barnsley

Failed to respond

Bradford

South Hawksworth Street – 1,165

Sharpe Street – 892

Calderdale

Harrison Road – 234

Armytage Road – 185

Craven

High Street car park, Skipton – 543

Coach Street car park, Skipton – 189

Doncaster

Market Place – 616

Armthorpe Road – 518

East Riding

Saturday Market car park, Beverley – 948

Butcher Row car park, Beverley – 403

Hambleton

High Street, Stokesley – 368

Market Place, Thirsk – 287

Harrogate

Valley Drive – 734

Swan Road – 489

Hull

Alfred Gelder Street – 1,163

Paragon Street – 930

Kirklees

St Peter's St, Huddersfield – 881

New St, Huddersfield – 718

Leeds

Clarendon Road – 3,003

Cookridge Street – 2,842

Richmondshire

Information not held

Rotherham

Howard Street – 427

Wellgate – 420

Ryedale

Market Place car park, Helmsley – 435

Cleveland Way car park, Helmsley – 237

North East Lincolnshire

Market Roof car park, Grimsby – 649

Leisure Centre car park, Cleethorpes – 576

North Lincolnshire

Failed to respond

Scarborough

Albemarle Crescent – 853

St Nicholas Cliff – 639

Selby

Audus Street car park – 57

South Parade car park – 46

Sheffield

Ecclesall Road – 2,790

Norfolk Street – 2,056

Wakefield

Wood Street – 841

Northgate – 722

York

Castle car park – 1,817

Piccadilly car park – 558