YP Letters: No easy remedy for hospital car park charges

PARKING at hospitals is a vexed question (The Yorkshire Post, February 29). It never used to be, of course, but now people own cars and want to use them to come to the hospital. The trouble is that many hospitals are in the middle of towns with no scope for increasing the capacity of their car parks. Parking space – for staff as well as patients and their visitors – is therefore likely to go on being extremely limited.

Although it’s a nice idea, reducing charges or making car parks free would simply make the situation worse because it would tempt local residents to unfairly take advantage of the free facility, leaving those who have legitimate reasons for visiting the hospital even worse off than they are now. And without the income stream from parking charges, the cost of manning and maintaining the car parks would necessarily fall upon budgets intended for the care of patients.

It’s worth noting that to help patients, both Doncaster Royal Infirmary and Scunthorpe General Hospital have set up efficient “Park and Ride” facilities, something I promoted enthusiastically when I was a governor at Scunthorpe. These do, at least, offer genuine hospital visitors a lifeline. Perhaps other hospitals could be encouraged to follow our example.