Parking Charges at Ruabon Station

[Philip Osborne]

I know I’m late bringing this up, but I personally don’t need to catch trains very often and so I only recently became aware that parking charges had been introduced. However, once I realised, I did a quick search online and found out how much extra this is going to cost the poor commuters who make use of this station (£400 per year!).
What I really don’t understand is some of the arguments given for why parking charges were introduced.
The statement “This survey work has also identified evidence to suggest some abuse of the parking provision by non-station users (people parking up and walking away from the station)” is so vague as to be meaningless. If it is a genuine and serious problem they should be able to give specific numbers. “Some” could mean 2 or 3 cars a week or 12-15 cars a day, my guess is that it is towards the lower end of the scale and that’s exactly why they have been so vague with the figures. There is nothing within walking distance of the station that is worth parking for and that doesn’t already have a free car park of its own … the library and doctors have their own car park, the shops have their own car park, even the pubs have their own car parks. So who exactly is supposedly parking at the station but not using it?!
To back up their argument that the car park is being “abused” by non-commuters, the only specific and verifiable figures they actually give are the fact that the car park is “full by 9am on a daily basis with 42% of the available spaces occupied before 6.30am.” I’m sorry, but that sounds exactly like the behaviour of commuters … do you know any commuters who would be catching the train AFTER 9am? So all the evidence has proven is that the car park is actually being well used by the very people its supposed to be used by!
This charge is nothing to do with managing the car park or deterring non-commuters from using it, it’s nothing more than a money-making scam by squeezing money out of the very commuters they try to con us into believing they are trying to help.

Edit:
Interestingly, the council’s own information page on the station sends a mixed message by listing charges in the paragraph at the top of the page, but stating “Free car parking” in the Facilities table at the bottom of the page!
https://www.wrexham.gov.uk/english/travel/rail/ruabon.htm

[pete]

I always noticed that the car park was pretty full at 7.30 (1 or 2 spaces left) but it was still around 50% full at 10pm at night.
I suspect some of the cars belonged to people living in the housing estate next door.

I also can’t believe people would park at the station to go to the shops: people park in the other car park or just park on the pavement on the road.

At the council meeting, it was said that the charges were being brought in to benefit rail passengers. I haven’t bothered to ask Cllr Bithell how the rebate for rail passengers works. It’s increased the cost of getting the train to Chester by 30%.

[Philip Osborne]

I wondered whether some of them were from the housing estate, but every house on that estate has a driveway as well as on-street parking, so there’s no excuse if they are the ones using it. But I don’t see why the council can’t operate a scheme similar to the way Home Bargains, Dun Elm and countless other stores do. Monitor the car park and then fine the minority who are using it inappropriately rather than charging everyone which unnecessarily penalises the majority who were using it correctly in the first place!

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