Vulcan commented on the wording of draft Policy STR8 (‘Parking Management’) as contained in the Regulation 18 Local Plan to encourage reference to the NPPF. Vulcan and its advisors also reminded the Council that the NPPF confirms maximum parking standards should only be included where there is a clear and compelling justification.

The wording of Policy STR8 (‘Parking Management’) as included in the Regulation 19 Local Plan is near identical to that of the Regulation 18 version, a difference being the previous referring to Appendix L with the latest referring to Appendix K (both being ‘Transportation Policy’). Appendix K (formerly Appendix L) confirms “there is no mention of minimum or maximum parking standards and the onus is firmly upon the Local Planning Authority to determine what is appropriate for their area by using local knowledge, benchmarking and best practice, taking into consideration the above criteria based on locally derived evidence.”

Given the representations to the Regulation 18 were an observation and the wording between Regulation 18 and 19 versions of Policy STR8 are closely similar, Vulcan makes no further submissions on the proposed wording of this policy.