No quick solutions for parking issue

At the April meeting of North Sunderland Parish Council, members voted to back double-yellow lines on both sides of the street on the stretch from the junction with King Street down to the entrance of Kippy Law and the former police station, because it is part of the route for the school bus and also provides access to the medical centre for ambulances.

This sparked a further consultation as the previous proposal was for just one side of the street.

At Monday night’s meeting, the chairman, Coun Geoffrey Stewart, said: “There will be a consultation and it will be some time before it gets to it.”

Coun David Shiel was concerned that only the residents directly affected were consulted the last time round.

“I would say the whole street needs to be consulted,” he said. “It’s starting to affect everybody.

“I have seen people parking there to go down to the bottom of town and going to the Co-op. They should park in the car park and pay like everyone else.”

A resident of James Street said that they were in favour of double-yellow lines on one side of the street and residents’ parking on the other. “None of the residents ever double-park, it’s the tourists,” she added.

She asked whether free parking could be introduced in the car park so visitors would park there instead of in the village’s side streets.

But Coun David Donaldson said it would ‘strangle the businesses’ and that one hour of free parking was introduced so locals could go down and do their shopping.