Visitors to West Midlands beauty spots face being slapped with new charges amid warning
Parking charges could be introduced at beauty spots across Worcestershire.
Cash-strapped Worcestershire County Council is planning to start charging at its car parks as it tries to plug a £70 million budget gap.
Sites include Worcester Woods Country Park, Hartlebury Common, Blackstone Picnic Place, Pershore Bridges Picnic Place and Eckington Wharf Picnic Place.
The council has not indicated what level of charges will be brought in, but budget papers show the introduction of charges is expected to bring in £90,000 across the 2026/27 financial year.
At a budget scrutiny meeting on Tuesday, Conservative councillor Karen May said: “This will displace parking from car parks, where you have to pay, onto nearby lanes.”
Labour’s Richard Udall said the car parking charges would “damage people’s access to the countryside”.
He suggested other ways of increasing revenue at Worcester Woods, including marquee hire, hosting weddings and events, and car boot sales.
Reform cabinet member Justin Bowen, responding to questions in the absence of leader Jo Monk and several other cabinet members, said: “We’re all ears.”
Cllr Udall claimed to have seen paperwork indicating charges would be introduced at Worcester Woods back in June.
At the time, finance chief Rob Wharton said there were “no current plans to introduce car parking charges at Worcester Woods Country Park”.
The suggestion was also met with a negative response from visitors to the park, who said the charges would put people off visiting.
Worcestershire’s previous Tory administration signed off on plans to introduce car parking charges at Worcester Woods in 2018 but withdrew the proposal from its 2019 budget following a public outcry.
Thousands signed a petition for the car park to remain free of charge and the council’s overview and scrutiny performance board voiced its opposition.
Cllr Tom Wells, the board’s current chairman, said in Tuesday’s meeting that the ward councillors for each of the affected car parks were likely to be “inundated” with emails from residents.
Cllr Adrian Hardman said the charges would be hard to implement at Eckington Bridge and that parish councillors were likely to fight the changes.
“I’m fairly neutral on it myself,” he added.
Councillors were told some capital investment would be needed to implement the charges, for ticket machines, barriers, signage and support from legal services for “ongoing enforcement”.