Where to Park for free/cheap in Cardiff

halibut2209

Going to Cardiff for the day on Friday (Daughter going to see X-Factor concert. I'm going to visit Doctor Who filming locations. Feel free to judge either of us!) and wondered if anyone knows of anywhere cheap/free to park

Dave_TH

http://en.parkopedia.co.uk/

Worth a visit

ILW

Apparently in any private car park (Shopping centre, Hospital, Disabled bay, etc) because the tickets they issue are only a request for a voluntary payment.

Lovelyjoolz

Ooooh, you picked a BAD weekend for coming to Cardiff! Wales vs Ireland on Saturday means that hotels will be filling up rapidly from lunchtime Friday and the already limited parking will become even more hard to find! Town will be madness Friday & Saturday.

Parking in Cardiff is EXTORTIONATE. Especially on weekdays. If you can drop daughter off at the door of Motorpoint Arena and then leave imediately it will save you the £4-6 it will cost to park in St Davids 2 (that's the minimum charge and covers 2 hours).

After 6pm there are plenty of places to park for free (St. Andrews Crescent, Churchill Way for example) but during the day its very expensive to park in the imediate city centre. Park & Rides are plentiful on the city outskirts however and cost £3 a car IIRC. If you're coming from the East you'll want the one on the A48 at Pentwyn.

But, if you're doing a Dr Who tour then are you going to the Dr Who Experience at the Red Dragon Centre? http://www.doctorwhoexperience.com/
because parking at the Red Dragon Centre is free as long as you get your ticket validated, which the Dr Who Experience will do. From there you can walk into town in 20-30 minutes, or catch a bus. They run fairly regularly.

A lot of the filming of Dr Who (and Torchwood) was down around Cardiff Bay and that is literally over the road from the Red Dragon Centre.

halibut2209

I was looking at the Dragon Centre. I've been to the Bay several times for Who-related escapades (got to meet Matt Smith when he ran with the Olympic Torch!), but will need to go there again as I promised my daughter a root beer float from Eddies!

Just another quick question. Here's a link to a street in Cardiff

https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=Havannah+Street,+Cardiff&hl=en&ll=51.462808,-3.173456&spn=0.002373,0.005252&sll=51.461338,-3.171057&sspn=0.001186,0.002626&oq=hav&t=h&hnear=Havannah+St,+Cardiff,+United+Kingdom&z=18&layer=c&cbll=51.462746,-3.173554&panoid=BnWf3dmSUs1mahLYnY4Rnw&cbp=12,41.5,,0,17.19

There are signs saying resident parking, but is that only for the marked areas? (not an expert on council parking!)

EDIT: And I'm coming down first thing in the morning and leaving that night

Lovelyjoolz

Yes it refers to marked areas only, but you'll find that 98% of the street is marked up for residents because all those buildings down there are flats & offices. The car park is permit only too I believe. Thing is though, as you're coming in on a weekday, most free on-street spaces are going to be taken up by commuters before 8:30am, so it's going to be difficult.

But really, the Red Dragon Centre is as close, if not closer, than that to the bay. And even if you don't do the Dr Who experience, you can buy a coffee at one of the restaurants to get your ticket validated.

Oh and don't start me on Eddies! I haven't been for a while and was craving their Corvette burger on yesterday
Probably because the Dr Who episode Eddies was featured in was repeated Saturday on Watch.

halibut2209

Yeah, I'll go to the Red Dragon centre

And I'm a fan of the Route 66 burger myself. And I must remember to pick up a special straw. Adds more fizz

Coupon-mad

halibut2209 wrote: »

I was looking at the Dragon Centre. I've been to the Bay several times for Who-related escapades (got to meet Matt Smith when he ran with the Olympic Torch!), but will need to go there again as I promised my daughter a root beer float from Eddies!

Just another quick question. Here's a link to a street in Cardiff

https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=Havannah+Street,+Cardiff&hl=en&ll=51.462808,-3.173456&spn=0.002373,0.005252&sll=51.461338,-3.171057&sspn=0.001186,0.002626&oq=hav&t=h&hnear=Havannah+St,+Cardiff,+United+Kingdom&z=18&layer=c&cbll=51.462746,-3.173554&panoid=BnWf3dmSUs1mahLYnY4Rnw&cbp=12,41.5,,0,17.19

There are signs saying resident parking, but is that only for the marked areas? (not an expert on council parking!)

EDIT: And I'm coming down first thing in the morning and leaving that night

That looks promising outside of the marked bays - but I would expect the rest of it to be marked with a single yellow by now, surely. Looks like a CPZ in progress as the bay lines are new in that picture and I would fully expect yellow lines then got added all around the bays.

halibut2209

Thanks for that

I'll be going to that area anyway as that's the road next to Rory and Amy Pond's house

I'll check out the road markings as well!

halibut2209

The roads are still as above and there was some on-street parking available. But still used the Red Dragon and got ticket validated no problem

And a highly successful day of location scouting