Parking on Kingsway Roads
Created by kingswayresidentWhilst I absolutely appreciate the difficulties with limited parking with some of the houses in the Kingsway development, there are a number of roads - for example Thatcham Avenue - which cause great concern to me, as I’m sure it does to other residents.
The roads are marked with double-yellow lines that are ignored (having spoken to the council and police it is the responsibility of the developers to enforce these yellow lines whilst the roads are unadopted).
It’s almost impossible to pass in a large car on some days (particularly at weekends) and for small children who might run out between the tightly packed cars, they have no chance!
This really is an issue that the developers need to give more consideration to.
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on Wednesday, April 23rd, 2008 at 12:54 pm
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April 23rd, 2008 at 1:48 pm
I think the problem is that when they first put the yellow lines in there was such an uproar that they painted over the ones on Thatcham Ave with black paint, ‘though I think they kept a short section close to the roundabout! Now the black paint is wearing off so it’s hard to tell what is and what aren’t yellow lines.
I agree with you though, getting onto Thatcham Ave’ from the roundabout is a nightmare.
April 23rd, 2008 at 2:07 pm
Hi kingswayresident,
Thanks for joining and contributing
Yes… the parking on Thatcham is a pain, my younger children aren’t allowed to cross unless I’m there to watch out for them
Interesting to hear about the responsibility of the developers to enforce double-yellow lines, sounds like a bit of a cop-out to me because they don’t have access to parking tickets or any way of identifying or penalising the owners. However, it would be nice to see something done now, otherwise it will only get worse
There are also several unmarked spots (awaiting road surfacing and – obviously – double-yellow lines eventually) like the corner of Chivenor Way (by Woodvale), where a car is repeatedly parked in a really silly spot… 5 yards would make all the difference!
From my experience in Linden, the Glos’ Council (and the Police) are completely hopeless at enforcing parking restrictions
April 28th, 2008 at 4:36 pm
I just wondered if there was a definitive plan of which roads would be yellow lined and which ones not.
April 29th, 2008 at 11:54 am
Hi mildenhall,
Thanks for joining and contributing
I’m pretty sure that there is no concrete plan. I say this because – in the statement from QUVL about the Woodvale markings they say: “double yellow lines have been now applied to Woodvale – the main through road. It was proposed to also apply yellow lines to Valley Gardens, but on further consideration and taking into account certain views expressed by residents, it was decided to limit the parking restrictions to the main road and for safety reasons the small stretch of Valley Gardens adjacent to the traffic light junction”… (full article here)
Clearly that isn’t the full extent of parking restrictions proposed (Thatcham Avenue is proof of this) but it does demonstrate that any plans in place at present are not “firm”.
May 1st, 2008 at 7:49 am
Thanks for the reply Clive.
I suppose my nom de plume gives away my interest.
But my concern is similar to yours in on Thatcham but refers to Valley Gardens instead.
The road by the small playground bends quite significantly and on a evening there is a continuous row of cars on the side opposite to the playground. It is impossible to see fully round the corner when approaching from either direction, leading to numerous stand offs and difficult reversing situations.
I notice yellow lines were painted and then it looks like they have been painted out too.
I wondered with the advent of the new school and yet more associated safety/parking problems whether they would be reinstated and if so whether they would be enforced?
May 26th, 2008 at 9:16 pm
I understand everyone’s concerns regarding parking, however has anyone though about the street signs? For example let’s take “Holbeach Drive”; the sign just says “Holbeach Drive” but off this road are two other roads, Headley Court and Cosford Close. So why does the street sign NOT say “Holbeach Drive” LEADING to Headley Court and Cosford Close, like all other street signs in the County seem to?
I work for the Emergency services, Trying to find a road in Kingsway is a nightmare and I live here! So imagine the fire engine trying to negotiate the poorly parked cars without a clue where they are going! Not forgetting that "Kingsway" is too new to be on GPS yet, so control rooms rely on local knowledge alone.
May 29th, 2008 at 8:39 am
Will Thatcham Avenue become a bus route, and then get yellow lines? I cannot see how a bus will get down that road otherwise.
Of course, some of the residents will probably still park on the road and then complain when a bus takes off their mirrors.
May 29th, 2008 at 2:23 pm
Hi Tony,
Thanks for joining us
My understanding is that Thatcham Avenue is destined to become part of the bus route through the Village and that parking restrictions will be applied once the road is completed.
May 31st, 2008 at 11:34 pm
I for one can’t wait until Thatcham avenue is fully yellow-lined. It is very dangerous at the moment. Every time I come home from work I’m constantly looking out for a kid running out between parked cars etc.
And I seem to keep seeing shopping trolleys pop up everywhere! Have I moved my family into another bad area waiting to develop?
June 2nd, 2008 at 8:09 am
The problem with full double-yellows on Thatcham (as elsewhere in the village) is that there is not enough provisioned parking for everybody. Kingsway is supposed to be a commuter village, yet there is (on average) one sensible parking place per household, and (again on average) 2 cars per household.
Where are they supposed to park? I have one car in my household, but use hire cars on business which generally won’t fit in my garage, hence it goes out the front…. And that does not even consider the question of visitors!
I think a sensible solution is to yellow line one side of Thacham (and the others) thus ensuring at least one side of access, but allowing parking. I would prefer this. If we don’t then people are going to want to pave over their front garden to provide another parking space and I think this is not a good thing!
June 4th, 2008 at 7:00 pm
Only double-yellow on one side of the road? That would create one massive, long, single-lane road without any passing places! Sorry, but that’s nonsense!
Thatcham Avenue is going to be the only access to Kingsway School and as a result, will be chaos in mornings and afternoons without yellow lines. Add regular bus services onto the same road and the requirement is quite clearly for no parking along that road.
The current parking situation risks lives and creates a high risk of accident.
If you have a need for more than one parking space, then rent or buy a house with more than one parking space. If your company provides a hire car and you park it illegally, I am fairly sure that they will not impressed when it gets damaged due to dangerous parking!
June 4th, 2008 at 6:12 pm
I agree about paving over the gardens. We already have someone doing that, having chucked a tonne of stone on top of the ruts created by sticking their car their since last year, and that looks awful.
But I’m not sure that a one-sided double yellow is practical. Firstly because the volume of cars on Thatcham Avenue mean that you generally have to travel a long way down without any pulling in points. So if another car comes (flying) around the bend, you’re knackered! I seem to get this already. I would also say that I personally dont want cars outside my place, and if they were opposite they would make accessing property problematic.
This seems to be the case in every development now. I’m afraid cash is king and space for parking does not equate to profits. Plus we are supposed to be getting the bus or using our bikes remember? We dont need our own cars!
(I’ll get down from my soapbox now)!
BD.
June 5th, 2008 at 7:37 pm
Parking is always going to cause someone a problem! However, the issue over safety on Thatcham Ave is of more concern to me than where we can park our vehicles!
(I wonder how many of us actually use our garages)!
Visitor parking seems to be a big concern. All around Kingsway there are pockets of land that could be converted into small parking bays. Maybe this is something that could be considered by QUVL? However, we would then face problems of residents using them as a permanent parking facility!
June 8th, 2008 at 7:55 am
Firstly, as I mentioned, my household does only have one car. But there are many around with the same parking, but with 2 permanent cars. I was using my own circ’s as an example, however your own cars are not the only issue. It’s as kingswaymum has said, visitor parking does not exist and unless you have no friends visit, this creates a problem (unless you buy a house with lots of car parking spaces)!
As an aside, when we bought this house we were told by the builders that yellow lines would not be happening outside our house, hence when it was announced that they might be going to put them in, I was a bit annoyed.
And as a point of clarification, the double-yellows are not outside my house (yet) and thus I do not park illegally.
June 8th, 2008 at 12:56 pm
My personal opinion on this is that the developers have been more than a little greedy in cramming houses into every available square foot of land and very optimistic in assuming that all residents would limit themselves to one car per household!
I’m fully in favour of reducing traffic but without a viable alternative it just isn’t going to happen.
The village is (obviously) a commuter area and – whilst those lucky enought to work in Quedgeley might be able to cycle and those working in the centre of Gloucester could catch the bus – everybody else is going to need a car to get to work.
Plus – as Baz says – we need some facilities for visitor parking.
Of course, extra parking would also be used by residents, (which proves how unrealistic the existing parking facilities are) but at least it would get cars off of front gardens and remove any excuse for illegal parking.
June 11th, 2008 at 4:21 pm
Agreed. The amount of hassle it’s causing us in Thatcham Avenue beggars belief!