Park life Reap what you sow Kelvin Reynolds offers some words of advice to ensure parking policies and practices yield the right results ctober is traditionally harvest time in the northern hemisphere, with a focus on all the good things around us. We celebrate reaping the rewards of our labours in the fields, which hopefully ensures that we will be well fed through the winter months, and look forward to the spring when the whole process of sowing and reaping starts over again. In everyday language in our modern society, if someone reaps what they sow, they suffer or benefit because of their own actions. How true O is this in the parking and traffic management community? I would say fundamentally, since it underpins everything we do. Achieving a good outcome with our parking and traffic management schemes is almost entirely dependent on good planning and implementation. Fair for all When kerbside space is at a premium and under pressure from a variety of competing demands, effective parking management is required to ensure it is kept fair for all and not a free for all. Charging for parking is never far from political and media commentators observations of what we do. While we can point easily to the reasons why people should pay for their parking (theres no such thing as free parking!), the plain and simple truth is that whenever and whatever the method of charging for parking, if we expect people to pay, it should be easy to do and easy to understand. It should not be overpriced, nor should people be overcharged. 47 PN Oct 2022 pp46-48 Kelvin.indd 47 23/09/2022 11:55