The north’s new parking enforcers have “earned” a potential £15,000 in their first week of doling out fines to errant motorists.
Penalties that could cost drivers as much as £14,580 have been served on motorists flouting parking laws in Inverness during the first week of Highland Council’s new parking regime.
The figure reflects the staggering 243 penalty charge notices handed out by enforcement officers in the Highland capital between Monday last week – when the scheme went live – and Sunday night.
Offenders will be liable to pay £30 if they stump up within 14 days, or £60 if they wait for more than a fortnight.
One motorist said the amount of money was “outrageous” and a councillor called for any profit to be re-invested in parking facilities.
A further 28 penalty charge notices were issued in Fort William, where the scheme is also being enforced, equating to fines of up to £1,680.
Parking enforcement officers have been patrolling the streets of both towns since October 3, but in the first three weeks of the scheme they confined themselves to warning offenders rather than issuing fines.
But, as the new figures emerged last night, members of the public criticised the severity of the scheme while others said drivers in the had become too complacent in recent years.
Inverness Central councillor Janet Campbell, who is pressing for a review of existing parking facilities in the west side of the city, said she was “disappointed” with the figure despite the warning period.
She added: “The intention with this grace period was to give people a fair chance. Hopefully this figure will not be repeated and lessons will be learned from this first week that it will be financially punitive if people do not heed the legally enforceable parking restrictions.
“It’s just a fact of life now that we must pay for parking and the important thing is that we have sufficient parking for motorists that do enter the city because that’s contributing to the economy of Inverness.”
The local authority has a team of 11 enforcement officers operating in the city and Fort William as part of a £550,000 plan to restore parking order to the streets.
Financial penalties were supposed to have been imposed from last Monday, but the local authority decided to hold off, as about 500 drivers in Inverness and another 200 in the Lochaber town had still received warnings.
In the week prior to the scheme going live last Monday, 300 drivers were caught in Inverness and another 100 were snared in Fort William.
Last night another member of the Inverness public, who did not want to be named, said: “Those figures are absolutely shocking and scandalous. They should place more effort on trying to track down people who have committed more serious crimes.”
Fort William councillor Andrew Baxter said: “The figure would suggest people have heeded the warnings in Fort William. Either that, or there are less significant parking issues in the town than in Inverness.
“I think the key will be to look at this again at this time next year and measure the success of the operation over the year.
Mr Baxter added: “When we first spoke about taking forward parking enforcement a couple of years ago, I made clear I did not want the scheme treated as a cash cow, and that if we did make profit that it should be invested back into car parks so they are providing additional spaces providing free parking.”
The local authority has said that money made from fines will be used by the local authority to offset the running of the service.