None of us are keen on parking charges, but some cheeky campers are chancing their luck in Cornwall. Towan Headland Car Park Newquay is a stunning location situated on a peninsular with the Ocean on both sides. A tempting place to Camp overnight. Council directly operated for many years, with a prohibition on overnight parking for vans, campers or sleepers, Cornwall Council understaffed with Enforcement officers found it impossible to enforce their rules. Covid had spurred a big increase for staycations and van camping, In this spot alone rules simply ignored, with dozens of vans parking and staying for the Summer creating controversy and a claimed environmental degradation. In 2022 Cornwall Council decided the best way of regulating the Car park would be to hive it off as an experiment to the wholly council owned company Treveth, In turn Treveth engaged national parking specialists Initial Parking to operate on their behalf. Initial Parking installed new payment machines and ANPR cameras rather than full time attendants. However the unmanned facility now sees some owners taking counter measures to prevent detection and automatic penalties, of a much as £85 per infringement, demands arriving down the line and through the post. Gaffer tape strips are seen obscuring plates and even complete number plate removal, leaving a dusty void. Regardless, Cornwall Council is now contemplating hiving off 50 more of its 231 Car parks, mainly in beach and rural locations. Cllr Peter Channon was concerned about the council going down the route of offloading car parks to private enforcement businesses "because everyone knows how contentious parking is with these companies".
* "We provide a service and, let's not kid ourselves, parking enforcement can get very, very unpleasant - everyone's been a victim of it. I think we have to be very careful as it's a very difficult thing to sell to the public. We have to balance it between getting a realistic return on our asset without going the other way and be seen to be getting money out of a system that can get quite unpleasant."
* He said Malcolm Bell, from Visit Cornwall, reported that the tourism company receives hundreds of complaints from holidaymakers about privately-run car parks but none about council-run sites.
* Meanwhile The Road Vehicles (Display of Registration Marks) Regulations 2001 state that number plates must be displayed, clearly visible, and easily readable. This piece of legislation makes no exceptions therefore arguments about public or private land or what constitutes a highway offer a flimsy defense. Vehicle owners are risking the possibility of a £1000 fine if found guilty, and of course, the avoidance of parking payment could be a separate offense. So beware of making an expensive Gaff with Gaffer tape.