Number plate recognition machines will be installed in a park in Bridgnorth to stop visitors evading charges and boy racers targeting the site.

Bridgnorth Town Council is hoping to have the new system put in place at Severn Park and fully functional before the start of the new tourist season next year.

Cameras are to be installed at the car park which will record the registration numbers of all the vehicles which enter it.

And when the vehicles leave all the driver has to do is key their registration into a machine and it will indicate how much there is to pay.

Anne Wilson, town council clerk, said: “The town council has agreed that they are going to put in number plate recognition parking machines.

“The number is taken as they go into the park and then when the come to leave they can put the registration number into the machine and it says how much there is to pay.”

Hourly

She said it was unlikely parking charges would rise but the new system would mean hourly rates could be charged.

The clerk said parking attendants were working at the park during the Rally in the Valley event and they had taken £1,830 in charges.

Usually there are no attendants monitoring the park and there have been problems with visitors avoiding paying charges.

Councillor Doug Brown said the system they were planning to bring in was in force in other areas of the country as well as in Europe.

He said there would be no need for barriers, which could get damaged by people running into them.

Mr Brown said a survey carried out over one weekend in August showed that only 30 per cent of visitors had paid for parking.

He said the park was not paying for its own upkeep and the new parking system would help to alleviate the burden on taxpayers and help the site become self-financing.

The scheme is going out to tender when the council will discuss the issue at its October meeting.

Mr Brown said it was hoped to install the cameras and machines installed by the next tourist season.

He said: “It will improve security and hopefully remove the boy racers tearing around and ripping up the grass.”

He said for regular visitors concerned about the charges there was a £10 season pass available.

The council recently took on a security firm to look up the park’s gates after concerns about staff suffering abuse from visitors.

By Lisa Rowley