Visitors to Bath’s Royal Victoria Park will soon be able to enjoy a longer period of free parking, with changes being introduced by B&NES Council.

From August, visitors to the park will be able to park for up to an hour free of charge. Currently, visitors to Victoria Park have to pay 50p for an hour’s parking. The new period of free parking is being introduced so that families can enjoy more time at the park free of charge, and will come in to effect near the start of the school holidays once the statutory notice period has been undertaken.

By introducing this new period of free-parking, B&NES’ Conservatives will also be reviewing parking charges introduced by the Council’s then Liberal Democrat administration in 2013. Last autumn the cost of evening parking at Bath’s Charlotte Street car park was also reduced from £5.40 to £1.50 after 6 pm.

Councillor Anthony Clarke (Cons, Lansdown), the Council’s Cabinet Member for Transport, said: “Royal Victoria Park is one of the finest parks in the country, and we believe it should be as convenient as possible for local people to visit the park and enjoy its facilities. I’m therefore delighted to confirm that from August we will be introducing an hour’s free parking at Victoria Park, so that local families can make the most of the park over the summer.

“In addition to this cut in parking charges, we have also been reviewing the periods of maximum stay in the park. At the moment, many of the parking bays are limited to a maximum stay of two hours. We are therefore planning to extend the maximum four hour stay across the whole of the park to allow more people to enjoy the park and nearby amenities for longer.”