The Council approved a budget increase of £196,563 to a total of £690,544 to ‘provide relief for local businesses’ in the Kelham/Neepsend Parking Project.
Kelham Island and Neepsend, which are Sheffield’s most up and coming area booming with restaurants and bars and modern housing, have received more funding to change the free parking spaces in this area.
Sheffield Council Finance Manager Capital and Construction Category Manager Damian Watkinson said “Were not implementing, not only pay and display at Kelham, but also at Neepsend’s.”
The report found in appendix one of the councils report tells us this is due to the high demands of available parking spaces in the area, which has led to ‘high levels of requests for parking schemes.’
Kelham Resident Adele Bannigan, 49, said “It gets so busy during the week at Neepsend when people park up and leave their cars for four to five hours. Which means we have trucks in the street.”
The parking scheme is already in place operating seven days a week between 8am and 8.30pm in Kelham as well as marked parking bays, with the other areas having double yellow lines, which is now coming into effect in Neepsend.
The original scheme when it was first announced was partnered with an active travel plan to make the area more walkable and cyclable, as well as increase use of public transport in the area.
Due to this new revision, the area requires new signage as well as paying for the new Pay and Display Machines leading to ‘an increase in the budget required following that decision..
This increase in budget is due to a decision made following a decision by the Transport Regeneration & Climate Committee on 11th December 2023, to include the whole of the Kelham/Neepsend scheme to have Pay and Display instead of the the loading and waiting restrictions with Neepsend that was in the original budget.
Mrs Bannigan further said “The area is beautiful and diverse and I think the use of cars parked up for hours ruins the vibrancy of Kelham and Neepsend, it’s supposed to be explored, not driven and parked up”.
