Spring 2024
Parking services are an essential public service that provides a range of benefits. It is not just about issuing penalty charges (parking tickets), it is about designing, implementing and ensuring compliance with essential measures that deliver safety, environmental and economic benefits.
Parking controls help keep people safe, like pedestrians, cyclists and our children outside schools. They help keep traffic moving and provide facilities for residents, businesses, disabled people, shoppers and commuters. They help keep bus stops clear for buses and bus routes clear so that buses can run on time. They provide safe and convenient places for vehicles to load and unload their passengers and goods.
In Bexley we have taken action to make parking easier, fairer, more accessible, and efficient for people visiting our town centres.
Parking Services will continue to have at least one pay and display machine within each car park and some on street locations as we recognise that although cashless parking is more popular than ever, not all motorists are comfortable using this technology.
The Council will also continue to monitor the number of parking spaces and the demand for these in local areas, to ensure that there is enough parking to support local businesses and residents, and that it is priced at a fair cost.
If you are a regular visitor to Welling, you may have seen the results of the work that Welling Town Business Associates C.I.C (WTBA) have achieved in the town. Working with their partners at Discover Welling, a resident’s organisation, they are bringing life to the town and making it an enjoyable place to live, work and visit.
Examples of joint initiatives include refurbishing the benches along the high street, tree planting and hanging basket displays, along with the installation of permanent lights on a row of prominent trees. The annual Christmas Lights and Welling Sparkle event that Discover Welling organise was enjoyed by the whole community. WTBA also arranged for 54 local disabled and sick children, along with their families, to take a bus trip to see the London Christmas lights.
Other events that the groups have brought to the town include the Welling Food festival and an Army and Uniformed Services day.
Plans are already in progress for more exciting community-based events in Welling over the coming year.
WTBA & Discover Welling are always looking to bring more improvements to Welling and would welcome involvement from residents and businesses.
A new banking hub opened recently at 97 to 99 Welling High Steet. The new Hub offers a counter service operated by the Post Office, where customers of all major banks and building societies can carry out regular cash transactions.
It also offers a Community Banker service where customers can talk to their own banking provider about more complicated issues, Monday to Friday, 9am to 5pm.
The hub came about following a community request from the Leader of the Council, Cllr Baroness O’Neill OBE to LINK, the UK’s cash access and cash machine network, for the return of banks to the high street.
Community Bankers will work on rotation, with a different bank available on each day of the week.
Cash Access UK is a not-for-profit company owned and funded by nine major banks. Their work is part of a new, collective approach to protecting access to cash.
100 lamp column/Bollard charge points will be installed across Bexley during the first half of this year as part of the borough’s commitment to protect and enhance our green environment.
The charge points are provided by Ubitricity and will be Type 2 (5kW) that are suited to longer stay charging, such as overnight, which will mean a reduced turnaround of vehicles so that local residents without off-street parking are not affected. Users will be able to scan a QR code or use a corresponding application on a mobile device, with payment and deployment of charge managed by Ubitricity’s online platform.
Find out more information on how to charge your vehicle on the Ubitricity website
If you have any queries or would like to request an EV charging point location please email Evcharging@bexley.gov.uk.
Thank you to everyone who completed our Customer Experience survey recently. Your input will help us to meet our customers’ needs better.
Everyone has different experiences of their contact with the Council, so it has been a priority for us to gather survey responses from as many – and as broad a range of - local people as possible.
We are now looking into the responses and will develop and implement an action plan based on the findings. Please watch this space for updates on the steps we will be taking to improve Customer Experience!