“Council have all summer to sort the problem” – solution to school parents pavement parking sought

Pavement parking around schools should be tackled this summer holiday is the view of one parent, with several others in touch over recent weeks over the issue.

One Wrexham resident has passed us a dossier of images of badly parked cars outside two specific schools, and told us: “I have to walk my two kids to school in this area every day, and it is impossible to get to St. Giles and St. Josephs without having to walk into busy traffic on the road at some point, because of inconsiderate parking blocking the pavement.

“I am sure the drivers believe they are in the right, because ‘where else can we park’ but I refuse to believe a broken wing mirror is worth a child’s life”

They added, “Obviously, we could walk the long way around, but that involves crossing more roads and again, putting kids in traffic.”

The issue is of course at its worst at drop off and pick up times for schools, and we are told St Giles are changing some timings in September to mean more students will be exiting the school at the same time.

Another resident told us the summer break is a perfect chance for ‘the authorities’ to put something in place to deal with the issues when they start again in the new school year although there appears to be uncertainty over who can sort the problem long term, “With the term ending the council have all summer to sort the problem out before the kids come back.”

Andy tweeted us the below image, which had a range of responses from the public, plus a reply from the council who batted the issue to North Wales Police saying “you will need to contact the police regarding this on 101 as it is a parking obstruction”.

Yesterday in a visit to the town centre police station we asked Sergeant Steve Arnold about the issue, and where the responsiblity lay, he told us: “It is down to us for enforcement at that time and we can deal with the offences there and then, but it is down to Highways and the Council to put up preventative measures to stop it happening all the time.

“Yes we can deal with a situation as it is occurring, but there is no way we would be able to sustain being there every day enforcing, so we have to look at long term prevention, which lies with the council.”

“It is not going to be an issue in the next months, but will rear its head again come September.”

Andy’s tweet widened the issue from the town centre schools, to one in Marford:

@wrexham The parking by the Rofft School Marford is ridiculous, people parked on the pavement!. We've had to walk the pram on the road, surely people can show more consideration than this especially to residents!!!!…. pic.twitter.com/MSXuRfSa7f

— Andy Moss (@mossy2991) July 16, 2019

Collette responded to the above picture being published saying, “It’s the same everywhere my son uses a wheelchair and the times we’ve had go leave the pavement and get on the road then unable to get back on pavement because there’s no drop kerb or idiots parking across the drop kerb, that’s our favourite!”

Others replied publishing their own snaps of similar problems:

St Joseph's Saturday lunch time was a good effort 😁 pic.twitter.com/1DprLTTU6k

— Colin Jones (@whatdidisayroy1) July 16, 2019

Following the exchange we asked Wrexham Council a couple of questions on the topic, noting that Welsh Government had announced earlier this month they were exploring ways of clamping down more widely on illegal parking, as well as pavement parkers, across Wales.

We asked what the council can do now, and if there were any policies or measures the council can enforce to tackle the issue.

We also noted there were recent discussions over parking permits in some town centre wards, and asked if there was any update on how that was progressing.

Wrexham Council did not reply.