Shropshire Star

Free festive car parking could come to Oswestry

A call for free car parking in Oswestry in the run-up to Christmas will be discussed by councillors tonight.

Published
Oswestry's Central car park

Two ideas will be discussed – having free parking for the two weekends immediately before December 25 or having free parking from 2pm each day between December 11-24.

Over recent years Oswestry Town Council, which runs Central and Smithfield car parks and the Smithfield, has offered the free afternoon parking.

Earlier this month, during a budget seminar, councillors discussed the idea for the two weekends of no-pay parking and agreed to debate it at tonight's markets and town centre committee.

Now the chairman of Oswestry Chamber of Commerce, Mark Derham, has written to the council, asking it to consider granting the afternoon free parking.

Mr Derham said: "I know that the town centre business community would welcome this contribution to increasing football across this period.

He said the chamber was also asking Shropshire Council to consider the same request for its car parks within the town centre.

In the longer term the town council is looking at bringing in a new parking charge strategy for its car parks in a bid to woo more people to the town. One of the ideas is to get rid of the hour parking charge for a two hour charge to encourage people to stay longer and although free evening parking.