Council charging to park on beach

Inflatable_Armadillo

I think you have your answer now and the answer is they do appear to have the right to charge, if and when they want, for motor vehicles to access the beach area... although I am not sure if that has been fully proven!

However, just like any private land owner or private parking company who charges for parking, they have no right of enforcement of the parking charge and would only be able to pursue the charge/damages through the courts. In the case of the what they have said, they would do that through civil trespass law if they felt compelled to do so at any point.

I suspect compliance with payment is probably 100% of people when asked, so suspect that the lads charging don't have anyway of issuing any sort of parking charges notices anyway and probably would not know what to do if you refused to pay. They can of course remove your car if you are trespassing, so if you refused to pay, the young man could ask you to leave and if you refused to remove your vehicle you would then be trespassing, they are quite within the rights to remove/tow your car from the beach and prevent you from entering the beach again.

I think in the scheme of things, this is just the council taking what appears to be a legitimate opportunity to bring in some money and unless they are not able to prevent access/charge and are doing this illegally on publicly accessible land, then I think they are acting reasonably in charging.

English_Electric

Here are the 'supposed' terms and conditions which are actually not specific to parking and are a set of byelaws pertainong to the beach.
Nothing about fines for overstaying or non payment.
My understanding is that they have no authority to fine and just rely on the goodwill and ignorance of visiting beachgoers.

English_Electric

Inflatable_Armadillo wrote: »

I think you have your answer now and the answer is they do appear to have the right to charge, if and when they want, for motor vehicles to access the beach area... although I am not sure if that has been fully proven!

However, just like any private land owner or private parking company who charges for parking, they have no right of enforcement of the parking charge and would only be able to pursue the charge/damages through the courts. In the case of the what they have said, they would do that through civil trespass law if they felt compelled to do so at any point.

I suspect compliance with payment is probably 100% of people when asked, so suspect that the lads charging don't have anyway of issuing any sort of parking charges notices anyway and probably would not know what to do if you refused to pay. They can of course remove your car if you are trespassing, so if you refused to pay, the young man could ask you to leave and if you refused to remove your vehicle you would then be trespassing, they are quite within the rights to remove/tow your car from the beach and prevent you from entering the beach again.

I think in the scheme of things, this is just the council taking what appears to be a legitimate opportunity to bring in some money and unless they are not able to prevent access/charge and are doing this illegally on publicly accessible land, then I think they are acting reasonably in charging.

I do now have my answer but I had never contested the right to charge and since parking is permitted in designated areas and the beach is a public right of way I do not believe they can sue for damages and they certainly cannot claim the £4 back since they would have to ahow there was a contract in place and an agreement to pay £4.