See how much you will now have to pay to park in Bath and North East Somerset

A Bath and North East Somerset local has created a website so you can find out how much you will have to pay in the area’s car parks.

Different cars will pay a different amount to park in Bath and North East Somerset Council car parks across the area. The council introduced “emissions-based parking charges” in Bath last year and is now rolling them out to car parks across the district.

Based on the idea that “the polluter pays,” cars with higher emissions have to pay an additional rate to park under the scheme. You do not need to know your car’s emissions as pay and display machines will look them up from the DVLA when you pay to park — but this means it is not always easy to know how much your parking will cost ahead of time.

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Now one local in the district has created a website — not affiliated with the council — to help people find this out. Put in your number plate and bathnesparking.co.uk will tell you the cost of parking at the car parks where emissions-based parking charges are in place or planned — and how much more this will cost you than drivers of the lowest emission cars.

The website’s creator said: “It's not always clear to members of the public how much they will be charged before turning up to the car parks and it's also interesting to know how much extra you'll be paying compared to a low emission vehicle. I'm a local resident just trying to make these changes and charges a bit clearer and easier to understand for other local residents!”

They added: “The website uses public information from council's consultation, data obtained from the DVLA's Vehicle Enquiry Service API [...] and it's free to use to lookup your vehicle. I do not run ads on the website so there is no direct monetary gain to get traffic directed to the website. It is intended as a free to use tool for people in the local area.”

The roll out of emissions-based charges and price increases to council-owned car parks in Bath, Keynsham, and Saltford will happen throughout November. The roll out to on-street paid parking locations in Bath will happen in January 2025.

The charges will also be introduced in the currently free South Road car park in Midsomer Norton and the Church Street and Waterloo Road car parks in Radstock. After a local outcry, the council have now said that parking will be free for the first two hours in the Somer Valley towns, and charges will be at a lower rate than in Keynsham.