| # | Name | Where do you live? (e.g Lindfield) | Your comments |
|---|
| 51 | Tom Wilde | Haywards Heath | Yes, I also have fallen victim to this ridiculous scheme. Having heard of the shambles, I allowed 15 mins extra for an appointment - queued - when 10 mins was up I quitted the queue and ran across to the surgery where the receptionist said "Well, there's space on our forecourt, park there," which I did. So in future I'll shop in Burgess Hill using the Waitrose car park. Not that it's cheaper, just dead simple and everyone pays for their parking however long they stay. What possessed Mid Sussex council to adopt this dappy scheme to everyone's annoyance and at terrific expense just to collect a few pence from unexpired tickets? So, no, I won't be using Haywards Heath while better alternatives exist. Must be terrible for mums with kids, disabled people and the like. |
| 52 | Colin and Jacqueline Tyler | Lindfield | The whole concept is misguided and the machines are clearly not properly designed for the task. This is taking a sledge hammer to crack a nut and is detrimental to traders and shoppers alike. |
| 53 | Anonymous | Anonymous | I've made a several attempts of trying to use these new ticket machines to no avail. I've ended up creating a long queue of angry shoppers and had to park elsewhere. Since the introduction of these machines i have not been shopping as much in the Orchards and prefer to go elsewhere. What a complete waste of taxpayers money. |
| 54 | Anonymous | Anonymous | Everytime i drive into the car park and see the queues at the ticket machines near the Orchards i drive straight back out and try and find nearby road parking. If it's creating long queues now what is it going to be like nearer Christmas, when the car parks are always full! Bring back the old ticket machines. |
| 55 | Anonymous | Anonymous | How did they calculate how much money they were losing by selling an hour's use of a parking space only once? How did that compare with the £130k pricetag on the cranky machines? I want my council tax spent by people who do maths not guesswork, so I won't be voting for the return of the present MSDC at the next local elections. |
| 56 | Mrs F Hayes | Ansty | I have queued for more than 20mins to get a ticket on at least 3 occasions. Have had to help older people work machines as they cannot see the letters properly. We should be able to pay for a shorter time ie.30mins. |
| 57 | Anonymous | Anonymous | Is it lawful for a public authority to install parking meters that are difficult for people to access by reason of age or disability?
Some £120,000 of public money has been wasted(not invested, as the council maintain) on this nonsense. How many years did the council estimate that it would take to pay this back through the additional revenue generated by preventing people handing on unexpired tickets (without putting the price up, that is!).
Goodness knows how retail trade is suffering. The town centre could do with a boost rather than a setback, as the economic outlook takes a downturn.
The council should be trying to attract customers at this time. You don't see Sainsburys or Tesco charging their customers for parking.
Get a grip Councillors. |
| 58 | Jeremy Langley | Haywards Heath | I had to wait more than five minutes due to the complexity of the machines confusing the three people in the queue in front of me. There was only one machine working. The machines also will not provide change or give you a pro-rata amount of parking time if there exact change is not available.
Idiotic!!! |
| 59 | Christine Bailey | Clayton | I think the mid sussex council have gone stark staring mad. These parking meters are the worst thing I;ve ever come across and until they remove them I shall be going elsewhere to do my shopping |
| 60 | Anonymous | Anonymous | What a ridiculous system, my elderly mother is now unwilling to come shopping on her own in H H all because of these frightening machines! We need canopies to stop the rain and to shield the sunlight or of course we could just go elsewhere to shop. I hear Horsham is good. |
| 61 | Paul Western | Haywards Heath | costly solution to a problem that did not exist |
| 62 | Mrs M Chapman | Lindfield | Since the introduction of the new machines which are not at all user friendly I no longer shop in Haywards Heath but instead go to Sainsburys. For very many years I have been a regular customer of A & K Smith & Sons Butchers in the Orchards as well as supporting the stall selling vegetables plus the other shops along South Road. These ridiculous machines should be replaced with a more effient system as soon as possible. |
| 63 | Mrs Christine Sugarhood | Lindfield | I havn't the time to mess about queueing for tickets.
I will not be coming into town unless absolutely necessary. There are plenty of other places to shop. |
| 64 | Gillian Porter | Burgess Hill | I went to the cyprus road car park on wed morning on my way to work, to go into town to pay some bills at the bank, there were approx 12 people queuing, it was 9.30 and i had to be in work for 10.00, there was no way i could queue because i would have been late for work, hence, i went back to my car and chose to use the waitrose car park instead, as had lots of other people as it was quite full. |
| 65 | R Chapman | Lindfield | Waste of ratepayers money. The contribution from developers could have been used for something useful. |
| 66 | Claire Dovey | Lindfield | you should be ENCOURAGING people to shop in town.. not putting them off! Money grabbers! |
| 67 | John Sutton | Burgess Hill | As usual our councillors have shown that they are complete idiots and a total waste of space. |
| 68 | patrick hill | burgess hill | Yet another waste of council tax payers money.A
thoroughly ill conceived scheme,just to prevent a ticket being passed on. |
| 69 | B R Oliver | Horsted Keynes | Cumbersome process, rubbish software, too many entries needed. Total waste of money, and as for the fraud argument, how about the fraud of not issuing change!! |
| 70 | MR CLIVE DEWSBURY | BURGESS HILL | Yet another waste of time and money. The machines are complicated time consuming to use. |
| 71 | Anonymous | Anonymous | presumably being installed to squeeze the last few drops of blood out of shoppers - quite disgusting as this will only increase illegal on street parking. Take a look at the dangerous parking outside the fish shop / post office by the station. |
| 72 | Anonymous | Anonymous | traffic wardens, or whatever they now call them would spend their time better stopping illegal street and pavement parking |
| 73 | kay waterman | haywards heath | If i wisdh to pay for an hour and only use 30 minuites of my paid for time i have the right to give the remaining time to who ever i please. i habe paid for it after all. |
| 74 | Anonymous | Anonymous | As stated above a waste of park users time and Council money. Have the Concil officials nothing better to do but think up unproductive means of obtaining a little extra revenue? |
| 75 | Anonymous | Anonymous | No time for queueing, have never been given or handed a ticket and I don't know many people who have. Not a strong enough argument to waste such a large amount of money and put so many people to so much inconvenience! |
| 76 | Anonymous | Anonymous | A ridiculous waste of money! Why don't the Council bring in a special rate for half an hour and then fewer people would need to pay for time that they do not use. |
| 77 | Anonymous | Anonymous | iagree that these new meters arereally difficult to mange. they should reinstal the old ones immediately |
| 78 | Christine Warren | Plumpton Green | I have stopped using Haywards Heath for the time being as I am fed up with wasting 10 miinutes queing for parking tickets. Completely pointless and just another way of trying to squeeze as much money out of people who already pay tax for these services as possible.
If you hadn't sacked the man in a box a few years ago and put ticket machines in then maybe the ticket swopping problem would never have occured.
Until the ticket machines are removed I will only use Haywards Heath to shop if absolutely necessary. |
| 79 | Mortimer, David | Cuckfield | The action of the council in installing the new Orchards car park shopping machine is contemptible, and acts directly against the best interests of the very people whom it should be serving - namely the traders and the taxpayers of the District. Insult is added to injury by the equally contemptible pretence that car parkers have been 'defrauding' the Council by offering unexpired time on the old-style tickets to those newly arrived. This legal basis of this argument was exposed as being without foundation by a lawyer in the Mid Sussex Times on 15th May. On the contrary, it was the Council that was defrauding its own tax payers by its failure to install machines that charged for parking according to time used; and/or by the use of machines that did not offer change.
The sooner the Council climbs down over its negligent (of its taxpayers best interests) decision to proceed with these costly, confusing and time-wasting new machines, the sooner it might be able to claw back some of the great amount of goodwill it has needlessly sacrificed |
| 80 | Joan Thomerson | Haywards Heath | A ludicrous waste of Council Tax money I object most strongly.Why change a tried and tested system which is easy to use.It is a punitive measure and unworthy of Local Councillors. |
| 81 | Sheila Mortimer | Cuckfield | This quite unnecessary impediment to the parking process behind the Orchards means I shall now be doing my shopping elsewhere in Sussex. |
| 82 | Anonymous | Anonymous | I agree wholeheartedly with the wording of the petition. The MSDC should be strongly reprimanded for wasting taxpayers money! |
| 83 | Anonymous | Anonymous | I consider the new parking machine none user friendly and time consuming, making life more frustrationg and dictatorial |
| 84 | Anonymous | Anonymous | Council wasting my money & time. AsI others have stated, we'll shop elsewhere i.e Sainsburys, because it's free & easy |
| 85 | Anonymous | Anonymous | Surely MSDC must realised that this system its not working. As you can see on this petition people all around the county feels very betrayed with this waste of our tax money. I am already not shopping in Haywards Heath as much as I used to. Take advice from Ucfield town center where they dont even charge people for parking. There its a lesson to be learn. |
| 86 | Anonymous | Anonymous | Councils treat the population as 'cash cows'. What a waste, replacing perfectly good machines at tax payers expense. They forgot long ago who they are working for.
Roll on the elections - get rid of Concils that don't represent the people |
| 87 | S. Sowerbutts | Haywards Heath | Another waste of residents money without any consultation. Having seen the queues and heard about the problems have avoided using car parks with the new machines. My husband after queuing behind some very disgruntled people tried the machines, had trouble with the machine accepting his money so he drove off. Go back to the old machines. It is NOT fraud to pass on a ticket if we have paid for that space for an hour. |
| 88 | N Bennett | Hurstpierpoint | The machines are a disgrace! The elderly have to use these machines and they are not friendly. The council are being greedy by installing the machines so tickets cannot be re-used. The council are not loosing money by people giving their tickets away out of goodwill as the space has already been paid for! |
| 89 | Anonymous | Anonymous | LOCAL AUTHORITY OFFICIALS HAVE BECOME COMPLACENT IN THE WAY THEY SPEND TAXPAYERS MONEY. THEY THINK THAT TAXES CAN CONTINUE TO RISE BY MANY TIMES THE RATE OF INFLATION. IT IS TIME THAT OUR COUNCILLORS DID THE JOB THAT THEY ARE ELECTED TO DO, THAT IS, REIGN IN THE OFFICERS ENTHUSIASM FOR SPENDING YOUR MONEY. THE £130,000 SPENT ON THESE MACHINES SHOULD HAVE BEEN CONTRIBUTED TO THE COUNCIL TAX FUND TO KEEP THE RISES DOWN.
I urge all petitioners to e mail Marks & Spencer to complain. Go to the M&S web site, click on to contact and store feedback, and tell them why you won't be visiting the Orchards store until the Council re instates the old machines. |
| 90 | Anonymous | Anonymous | What a complete waste of money. Will do more online shopping and only use the car parks in HH on a Sunday. Horsham is worth visiting - a far superior town to HH. |
| 91 | Anonymous | Anonymous | I am now really put off coming to park in Haywards Heath as I find the machines too hard to negotiate.
What are you thinking?
Who trialled these machines to see if they are suitable?
I resent leaving a line to check my reg number as I never remember the number.
I can usaully get any technology but this is too much for a parking machine.
I will not buy another thing at the orchard shopping centre until the machines are removed. |
| 92 | claire johns | newick | "ridiculous"
The new system has just cost me 15 minutes of my valuable time, 5 of which were spent helping senior residents.
I for one will avoid Haywards Heath and shop at Burgess Hill - and will be voting for anyone who changes the new system. |
| 93 | Jim Clapperton | Haywards Heath | Ill concieved and another example of individuals exceeding their level of incompetence. If change was needed, which I doubt, then a system as at the Waitrose car park in Burgess Hill would have been simple to administer and already acceptable by the public. I suggest nobody pays and let the Council take us all to court. If the officers had any intelligence at all, this petition would not be necessary as they would take public opinoin on board and do something about it NOW. |
| 94 | S. Kirby-Turner | Danehill | The machines are ridiculously complicated to use, and even now, when people have had time to get used to them, are causing unacceptably long queues. It cannot be cost-effective to oblige drivers to queue for 10 minutes to get a ticket, during which time, their cars are taking up parking spaces for free! If the council want to stop drivers passing on tickets, they should introduce a 20-minute parking option, so that we don't have to pay for time we won't use. |
| 95 | Michael and Mary Hemery | Lindfield | The expenditure on these completely unnecessary meters is a waste of ratepayers money which appears to be justified on the grounds that people pass underutilised tickets to new people parking.I agree entirely with the correspondents to the Middy who have stated that it is you the council that are defrauding the public by taking fees which have already been paid for a minimum period of time twice;it would appear that this council has not the slightest idea of the importance of easy and inexpensive parking to thriving commercial community.Rents rates and parking fees are reducing Haywards Heath to a no go area consisting mainly of charity shops and restaurants whilst at the same time making it impossible for the shopkeeper communityto provide some sort of competition to the the supermarkets who have ample free parking a prerequisite for successful retailing.It is time some body independent of the council was formed to examine the amounts of money being spent on Parking Management as well as equipment ;if it is felt that the public have to pay to be able to use their own local shops then a simple system as used in France where one pays for the time one requires the parking space for and no more should be introduced and this present nonsense scrapped.
Tell me did the councillors elected at the last local elections make mention of their intentions to spend our money on this project; As for the operation of the meters I will not repeat what many have already said because they are correct. |
| 96 | Ann Symonds | Burgess Hill | I used to shop regularly in Haywards Heath but haven't been since the new parking machines were installed. When I did attempt to park - there were about 8 people at each machine - what a time wasting exercise these machines are causing. Council Officials should be on our side - its absolutely ridiculous to install these things. We should be supporting our local shops after all they pay enough in council tax as do we. Please reconsider. |
| 97 | Michael Rider | Chailey | Poorly designed kit - geekish and counter-intuitive. Were the machines tested on a cross section of the public before being marketed? The results? Did MDC ask these questions of the manufacturers? The machines create quite unnecessary hostility in those happy enough to accept the principle of paid parking. Why change the former system anyway? User-unfriendliness and insensitive handling - both avoidable - do little to encourage the consent required in a democracy - particularly at local level! |
| 98 | Piers Bonnett | Burgess Hill | I will not park in town on principle now. Another way of wasting tax payers monies, why not just refund us some back! oh the thought!! |
| 99 | Anonymous | Anonymous | why why . simple parking machines , so people
can understand them . three parking attendent
on saturday this seem very silly so please put the machines back as they were , or use token |
| 100 | ian mcinnes | sayers common | I can't believe that the council lose that much by the tickets been passed on as i have only ever been offered a ticket once, which i refused as it only had 30 mins left on it. I bet the extra money these machines cost over the old style is not recouped but i bet more parking tickets are issued for the wrong number plates on the ticket due to the user getting it wrong. Maybe this is where the parking department expect to make the extra money to pay for these machines, perfect excuse. |