211 fined in Gay Village as cars cover pavements on ‘lawless’ street … – msnNOW
A resident of Birmingham’s Gay Village has hit out at “lawless” parking, speeding, and drug taking which plagues one of the city’s most popular cultural destinations. This much-loved quarter of the city is home to clubs, theatres, a cinema, and many restaurants and pubs which are part of the Southside Business District, but the chaos caused by drivers flocking its streets nightly is miserable for some who live there.
A recent tweet by Southside District Birmingham claimed in the lead up to Christmas that 211 parking tickets were issued during one Saturday night alone. Cris Anscombe, 41, lives on Bromsgrove Street where the Arcadian Car Park provides 24-hour parking, 364 days a year, as confirmed by the Arcadian’s office.
Despite this, cars are regularly parked nose-to-tail and squashed in at all angles on the pavements, an issue which Mr Anscombe says forces people, often drunk, to walk into the road and put themselves at risk. He added: “Bromsgrove Street is pretty lawless generally, in terms of speeding and anti-social driving and it’s particularly bad at weekends.
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“Road noise, particularly car horns, goes on throughout the night. There’s also drug taking, particularly nitrous oxide, pretty openly being done in cars, which are often driven away by obviously drunk or drugged people.
© Cris Anscombe. Cars line the pavement of Bromsgrove Street opposite the Arcadian car park. Credit: Cris Anscombe.
“Ultimately the only solution is to close the road, that not only deals with the parking it deals with the speeding and other antisocial driving. It also protects the outdoor seating areas of gay bars which are wide open for someone to drive a car through at speed.
“Contrast the lack of protection these bars have with the huge barriers elsewhere in the city or even further up the road by the Hippodrome. Giving out tickets doesn’t change behaviour, it’s basically a parking charge that people risk, knowing they’ll rarely get caught.
“Cars need to be towed away at minimum, there need to be meaningful consequences of putting people’s lives at risk.”
When approached by the LDRS, the recently appointed Night-time Economy Champion and Southside Business Improvement District (BID) board director Lawrence Barton said the board will be “putting forward proposals to improve the parking situation in the city centre” at its AGM this month. Mr Barton, who also runs three popular hospitality businesses in the area, The Nightingale, The Loft, and The Village Inn, said it was “right that the council try and stamp out this bad behaviour by a minority of drivers” by issuing parking tickets.
He also said “dangerous and inconsiderate parking” could deter people from visiting shops and venues while also posing a risk to pedestrians and wheelchair users. He added: “The customers and patrons of our city centre shops and hospitality venues should be able to access our businesses as easily as possible.
“That means being able to park their car safely and close to their destination but it also means pedestrians should be able to benefit from safe and accessible walking routes.”
Birmingham City Council were similarly critical of irresponsible drivers but did not offer alternative solutions or sanctions for perpetrators other than reminding car users of widely-available nearby parking. A spokesperson said: “We would always encourage people to use public transport when travelling into the city centre, or consider walking or cycling where possible.
“For those driving in there are a large number of parking spaces available across the city centre and many have live capacity information displayed on information signs within the ring road to aid people in their decisions as to where to park. There really is no excuse for this sort of illegal and inconsiderate parking, which affects other road and pavement users.”
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