Council slammed for opening new Winslow car park without consulting residents 'properly'

Residents were “not consulted properly” over car parking at a new train in Winslow, the local council has said.

Winslow’s new station, which is still being built, is part of the new East West Rail project launched by the Government to improve train travel between Oxford, Milton Keynes and Cambridge.

Before the station opens in 2025, it will need to have an approved parking management plan covering a drop off and pick up zone, a taxi rank, the allocation of parking spaces and charges.

However, Buckinghamshire Council has been accused of mishandling the ongoing public consultation on the plans and failing to publicise it.

Winslow Town Council claims officers from the unitary authority “went ahead with their consultation without taking account” of most of its comments.

In an open letter to John Chilver, the Bucks Council member for the ward, the Town Council’s Roger Slevin, said the unitary authority had “failed provide formal notice” of the arrangements for the online consultation.

He said: “We could find no corresponding information about the consultation event on Buckinghamshire Council’s main website.

“And no information was delivered door-to-door, so those who are not ‘online’ would only know about this consultation by word of mouth from neighbours or friends.

“This is hardly a reasonable basis for a democratic community consultation.”

Mr Slevin also claimed that Bucks Council officers consulted the public without providing relevant background information and that those responding to the online questionnaire did not have access to information given to attendees of the drop-in session.

He added: “The quality of consultation responses inevitably will be adversely affected by this inadequate and incomplete information available to consultees.”

Winslow Town Council called for clarity from Bucks Council on proposed parking charges, which it said would affect how far train users may be prepared to walk to find free parking.

Councillor Chilver said: “The Winslow parking plan informal consultation event on 13 December was publicised by Buckinghamshire Council on locally focused social media channels.

“In the run up to the event we had a number of discussions with Winslow Town Council so not only were they fully aware of the event and the consultation; they helped us to find a location for the meeting; and the Town Council offered to help publicise it.”

He claimed the event went “very well” as over 100 people dropped in and “expressed their gratitude that we were seeking their local views prior to the formal consultation which is due to take place next year”.

The council said the informal consultation is still open until January 9, 2024 and people can take part in the following ways:

• Complete the online survey using this link: https://yourvoicebucks.citizenspace.com/roads-parking/winslow-station/
• On our TraffWeb site – Public Consultation scheme IC 039 – Static
• Complete, and return, a printed version of the survey (PDF 0.25MB)
• Email us at [email protected]
• Write to us at Traffic Regulation Team Floor 10, Buckinghamshire Council, Walton Street Offices, Walton St, Aylesbury, HP20 1UA