Ashford council car parks would charge £2 overnight and £1.40 an hour from 1 January 2027, and four free parking offers would go. Cabinet decides on Thursday.

Leaving a car overnight in an Ashford council car park would cost £2 from 1 January 2027, under proposals that go to Cabinet on Thursday. There is no overnight charge at all at the moment.

Every other tariff would rise on the same date. On-street parking would jump the furthest, from £1.30 an hour to £2.00. Four existing free parking offers would be scrapped, three of them on Sundays and bank holidays.

The proposals are set out in the Parking Tariff Review report to Cabinet, published on 2 September. Cabinet meets at 7pm on Thursday 10 September in the Council Chamber at International House, Dover Place.

What each stay would cost

Charges in council car parks are the same across Ashford and Tenterden. They run from 8am to 6pm, except where a lease sets different hours, as at Elwick Place. The proposed increases are close to 8% on most durations:

Bar chart comparing current and proposed Ashford Borough Council parking charges: up to one hour £1.30 rising to £1.40; two hours £2.60 to £2.80; three hours £3.90 to £4.20; four hours £5.20 to £5.60; over four hours in a long-stay car park £6.00 to £7.00; over four hours in a short-stay car park £13.20 to £14.00; on-street £1.30 an hour to £2.00
Every published tariff in the report, current and proposed. The all-day rate in a long-stay car park rises by a pound, and the on-street hourly rate by 70p.

The steepest single rise is on-street. The report says £2.00 an hour “reflects the limited availability of spaces and the premium associated with proximity to key town centre amenities and services”.

The £2 overnight charge would run from 6pm to 8am in every council-operated car park, which is the whole of the period when parking is currently free. The report puts it at “a low-cost and convenient option” that recognises the lighting, cleansing, security and maintenance the car parks still cost outside charging hours.

Blue badge holders would keep three hours free in any council car park.

The free parking that would end

Four offers are listed for removal:

  • Station Road, Ashford, free after 3pm on Sundays and bank holidays: removed
  • Flour Mills, East Hill, free on Sundays and bank holidays: removed
  • Elwick Road, free on Sundays: removed once the interim car park at Park Mall opens
  • Free After 3pm at Elwick Place: removed from 1 November 2026, and moved to the new temporary car park on the Park Mall site for six months once it opens

The Elwick Place change was already decided under delegated powers and is not part of Thursday’s vote. Bridewell Lane in Tenterden, free on Sundays and bank holidays, does not appear in the report’s removal list.

The report resolves a naming muddle that has run through the council’s own paperwork. The decision record published on 4 September said the free-after-3pm offer would move to “Edinburgh Road Car Park”; the press release said the “temporary car park on Park Mall site”. Thursday’s Cabinet papers make clear these are the same thing: one interim surface car park, replacing both Park Mall and the Edinburgh Road multi-storey.

Permits, season tickets and vouchers

  • Zone A resident permit: unchanged at £130
  • Zone B resident permit: £60 to £70
  • All other resident permits: £40 to £50
  • Visitor permits: unchanged at £1
  • Business permits: £594 to £650
  • On-street business permits: £40 to £50

Eligibility would be simplified so that any home inside a permit zone can apply. Flats would qualify only where the development has no off-street parking of its own. The cap of two permits per property stays.

The separate season tickets would be merged into one Town Centre Season Ticket covering key Ashford and Tenterden car parks, at £85 a month, £244 a quarter, £452 for six months or £850 a year. A book of 10 car park vouchers would rise from £37.50 to £49.50, taking a single session from £3.75 to £4.95.

Why the council says it needs the money

Parking tariffs were last reviewed in July 2023 and put up that October. Council policy is to look at them every three years, so they are due.

The report sets out what has happened to costs since. Business rates on the parking service rose from £335,918 in 2020/21 to £434,756 in 2025/26. Electricity is “almost four times higher” than in 2020/21. The service still makes a surplus, and that surplus is relied on across the council’s wider budget.

The tariff rises alone are forecast to bring in about £223,000 a year. Roughly £55,000 of that would land inside the current 2026/27 financial year, money not built into this year’s budget.

The overnight charge is a much larger and much less certain number. With 2,105 off-street spaces at £2 a night, the report models:

  • £153,665 a year at 10% overnight occupancy
  • £460,995 at 30%
  • £921,990 at 60%

Officers say the low figure will be used for financial planning until real occupancy is known. One-off costs of about £12,000 for new tariff signage and payment system changes would be recovered from the extra income.

How Ashford would compare

The report benchmarks the proposals against neighbouring authorities. At £1.40 for an hour, Ashford would still sit below Maidstone (£1.50), Dover (£1.80), Folkestone (£2.60) and Canterbury, where a premium city-centre hour can reach £3.70.

For a long stay of more than four hours, £7.00 compares with £8.50 in Maidstone and between £15 and £18 in Canterbury. The £2 overnight charge matches Canterbury’s; Maidstone charges £2.60.

Ashford’s own County Square NCP, the report notes, charges £10.00 for five to six hours and £15.00 for six to 24.

The risk the council names itself

The report is unusually direct about the politics. Its risk section identifies “adverse public perception, particularly in relation to the reduction or removal of existing free parking provisions”, and the possibility that higher prices simply drive parking demand down.

Officers also want to review tariffs every two years instead of three, and to make future changes take effect in January rather than later in the financial year. The stated reason is that smaller, more frequent rises are easier to absorb than large occasional ones.

What it means for you

Nothing changes on Thursday. If Cabinet approves the report, the new charges take effect on 1 January 2027, and the council must first amend its Traffic Regulation Orders through the statutory notice process. That is a further opportunity to object.

Two things are worth acting on sooner:

  • If you park free on a Sunday at Station Road, Flour Mills or Elwick Road, that is the offer most directly at stake. Our parking guide sets out which council car parks are currently free and when.
  • If you leave a car overnight in a council car park, whether for a night out, a shift or an early train, budget £2 a night from January.

Members of the public can ask a question or speak on any item on Thursday’s agenda under the council’s Public Participation Scheme, Procedure Rule 9. Democratic Services take requests on 01233 330349 or at democraticservices@ashford.gov.uk. The full agenda and papers are published online.

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