Letter from Slough Council.

At our MAG meeting on the 11th of December, Clive announced that he had a letter from Slough Council! After the cries of 'you should pay your council tax then', 'frame it' etc. had died down, we discovered that they have actually sent us a letter regarding Motorcycle parking in Slough. This is what it said -

Dear Mr Crocker

Thank you for your recent telephone inquiry passed to me in relation to motorcycling issues.

Council operated public car parks do provide motorcyclists with twice as much parking time for the equivalent car parking charge. However the Queensmere car park is a privately owned car park made available for public use and as such may operate a different charging and motor cycle parking policy.  I am still unclear in relation to the loss of the secure parking by this car park.

In terms of the White Paper on the future of transport the Government recognises that mopeds and motorcycles can provide an alternative means of transport for may trips.  Mopeds and small motorcycles may produce benefits if they substitute for car use but not if people switch from walking, cycling or public transport.  However the Government also states that motorcycles are three times more likely than a car to have an accident involving a pedestrian in built up areas.

Given these complex issues the Government is setting up an advisory group to bring together motorcycle interests and other interested parties to consider the role of motorcycling in an integrated transport policy.

The Government also suggests that local authorities should take account of the contribution that motorcycling can make and consider specific measures to assist motorcyclists, such as secure parking at public transport interchange sites.  If your group have any suggestions for any other low cost measures for different locations in Slough please let me know so that they may be considered further.

Yours sincerely,

Chris Boylan
Transportation Policy

Although MAG were pleased to find out that the council are not completely ignoring us, this letter was very disappointing.

The first paragraph tells us about the car park near the old motorcycle parking - what does it matter what the situation is with buildings near our old parking place? Unless he is implying that the whole area is privately owned? He makes it clear that he does not know what happened to our parking there - maybe he could find out? He does tell us that parking our bikes is cheaper than parking our cars. Issues of parking in car parks has been dealt with elsewhere on this web site. Cyclists have not been told to park in a car park - probably because the council can understand that this would not be appropriate, perhaps they could apply the same reasoning to motorcycles.

The second and third paragraphs point out that the White paper is not clear cut and that there are many issues to consider. I would hope this means they are considering us now rather than removing our parking places without any consideration. We have been told verbaly to park on the pavement near the library, this will not help the statistic that Chris mentions. I'm not going to start quoting statistics as they can be used to 'prove' anything.

The last paragraph has a positive note but does not commit the council to anything. This is the main problem with the letter, it does not promise or explain what has happened or what is going to happen. Another problem is a lack of any recognition of the special parking requirements of motorcyclists. Interestingly, there is no mention of parking our motorbikes in the cyclists area near the library. We have been told verbaly that this is a recommended area by the council but they have not put it in writing. Perhaps they are realising that taking away parking spaces from more environmentally friendly means of transport is not a good idea and that taking away space from car drivers would be more politically correct.

These are just the personal thoughts of Peter Smithson who maintains this web site. I look forward to MAG's official response to this letter and hope that we can work with Slough Council on this issue.

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