Wrexham Council rakes in more than £100,000 in two months after ending free parking scheme

Wrexham Council has raked in more than £100,000 in the first two months since axing a free parking scheme.

Free parking after 11am in city centre car parks operated by the local authority came to an end on April 1 this year.

The car parks impacted are at Waterworld, Market Street, St Giles, Crescent Road, Wrexham Library and Crescent Road.

FOI figures obtained by Wrexham.com show the council received £50,589 from parking fees in April and £53,980 in May.

It represents an increase of more than £30,000 per month from the £18,138 made in April 2023 and £20,797 in May of the same year.

The free parking initiative was first introduced by the council in October 2020 to support key workers and city centre businesses during the coronavirus pandemic​.‌

But with the authority facing a difficult financial outlook ‌and concerns the scheme was being ‘abused​​​’‌ by city centre workers, senior councillors voted in favour of axing it.

A report presented to executive board members in December said that many city centre car parks were operating at or above the desired 85 per cent occupancy level.

However, analysis and anecdotal evidence showed a significant proportion of people parking in city centre car parks were leaving their vehicles there for long periods to go to work.

Council leader Mark Pritchard told us at the time that the lack of availability of parking spaces was also an issue when the scheme was in place.

He said: “We’ve had lots of complaints from people coming to Wrexham who want to spend some money who can’t find any car parking.

“That’s because people were paying £1.80 and stopping there all day, which was disappointing because we did that purposely to encourage people to come in.

“Would we have liked to have continued giving away free car parking? Of course we would have, but we always knew it would come to an end.”

The charges, which are in place 24 hours a day, seven days a week, can be viewed in full below: