Parking Consultation: Zone J / JJ

Zone J

Parking is a subject almost guaranteed to produce an emotional response from local residents. Should there be open parking? Or should there be parking restrictions? If so, where, and how will they work?

Parking Zone J/JJ (see left) seems to be more contentious than almost any other in the Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham.

Parking challenges include proximity to Westfield, and also QPR match days - which fill up local parking spots with visitors' cars.

A local action group, Zone J Parking Campaign, is opposing the Council's latest plans.

Parking Zone J/JJ

Parking Zone J/JJ is problematic because of its proximity to Westfield, and also weekend QPR matches. Many local residents find they cannot park near their houses on weekends, because of visitors filling up the available parking. Not surprisingly, they are in favour of a Residents' Parking Scheme.

But other local groups, such as St Stephen's Church and the local Mosque, prefer open parking, as this is easier for their visitors.  They came together to form the "Zone J parking Campaign". You can see their reasons for opposing parking restrictions here.

Our council can't satisfy everyone, so they have run a number of consultations to try and find a consensus, or at least a majority view. But these consultations have themselves become mired in controversy.

Cost of Consultations
Consultations are expensive; each one costs our local council in excess of £50k - and that doesn’t include the time of the Councillors and Council officers who are involved in the process. The latest consultation also involved a number of evening focus group meetings with residents.

2019 Consultation
The 2019 consultation closed in July, and was carried out as a result of legal action which contested the result of the 2016 consultation.  In 2017 the new parking restrictions were challenged by a coalition of local residents and interest groups, hence the new consultation.

But the 2019 consultation itself has not been concluded, since there is now further legal action now being taken against the Council.

As of June 2019, the Zone J Parking Campaign announced it is "seeking legal advice" about  “fatal flaws” which "invalidates the whole consultation".  Zone J resident David Mills, who in 2017 took successful legal action against the Council over the way it introduced the present parking scheme, said it is “incomprehensible that the Council should once again be trying to force extended hours on us, rather than holding a fair and impartial consultation on whether residents want them."

Other residents disagree, and think that that the consultation has been carried fairly. They also believe that the parking restrictions in Zone JJ have in fact worked, and improved local residents' quality of life with easier parking, and less congestion.

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