RIP The Lord Street Car Park, the Wild West of Parking Spots

There are a great number of things that infuriate me. Catching my jumper on a door handle when I’m in a rush. Getting trapped behind a slug-paced walker who’s taking up THE WHOLE pavement so I can’t get past. Self-check-out machines that tell me I haven’t put my multi-pack of Wotsits in the bagging area. ‘I HAVE. THEY’RE RIGHT THERE, YOU STUPID IDIOT ROBOT.’ But nothing makes my blood boil more than when looking for a place to park in Douglas. So, naturally, it filled me with immense joy to hear Lord Street car park has closed.

The era of the Lord Street car park – the one behind the bus station – is over. And what an era it was. It was the Wild West of the capital’s car parks. A place unregulated, where no traditional parking rules or etiquette applied. A free for all set up, in every way. One day, some bold soul who’d reached the end of their tether after driving around Douglas for 6 hours looking for a spot decided ‘screw it, I’m just going to park here’ away from any space markings and the rest of us soon followed suit. Here was a place where you could dump your car anywhere you wanted for as long as you wanted and suffer no formal consequences. Traffic wardens could have had a field day but left it well enough alone either out of grace or out of fear the Wheelers from Return to Oz would appear en-masse from underneath a bonnet and wheely them to death.

Yes, it was a flawed system. Due to the only rule being that there weren’t any rules, many would come back from a nice stroll down Strand Street only to find themselves blocked in by an extended line of cars and have to get comfy for an unknown amount of time – hours, days, entire weekends – waiting for the owner to return. Many thoughtful souls tried to make the most of the space so as many people could park there as possible by pitching up an ant’s antenna away from your car, meaning, if you were any larger than a greenfly, you’d be stuck, incapable of even sliding up next to your door. One person tried it and ended up sandwiched for a fortnight because the owner of the car next to his had buggered off on a half-board holiday to Corfu. But it was a risk and a price we were willing to pay because we had no price to pay for parking here. It was FREE.

But no more. Foreboding barriers have been put up around the place, locking in any strays. So, if you happened to be on holiday on 22 June and had parked there, it’s now one of the permanent residents of car jail until it’s eventually crushed into Ford KA jelly underneath the block of 85 apartments soon to be built. And that’s not all. We’ll also be getting a four-screen cinema, office space, commercial units, and bus facilities. All exciting things, that we’ll no doubt be able to enjoy sometime after 2062. The only issue will be, besides the bus facilities, WHERE WILL WE PARK TO USE IT ALL?

In April, Douglas City Centre Management took to their Facebook page and asked the people of the Isle of Man what single change would encourage them to visit the city centre more often for shopping or leisure. The most common response: Parking. More spaces that were either cheaper or free, and more accessible.

Apparently, there are enough spots in Douglas if some of us are willing to pay. But we’ve seen from public response that having to pay for parking and the risk of not being able to find a free spot actually deters people from coming into town all together. Why put the effort in when you can order online. If we want to encourage locals into town to buy, buy, buy, predominantly putting their worth and value on how much they can contribute to the economy, then cut them some slack on parking. It might not seem like a lot, £2.50 here and there, but in a cost-of-living crisis where belt buckles are being persistently tightened, free parking can be that small thing that alleviates a little pressure in someone’s day and makes a community feel slightly more looked after. If the main priority is taking their hard-earned cash in town, at least give them the grace of not having to pay to spend.

Douglas City Council has assured the public it’s mind-mapping ideas to address the PPP (public parking problem). Until solutions are unveiled, allow me to propose some alternative parking spots:

• The Tower of Refuge – None one EVER parks there. Prime spot hiding in plain sight.
• The Ben my Chree. It’s always chilling out by the harbour wall. Just drive on. If it sails off then you can spend more time and money in town as you wait for it to return after a nice mini-break.
• Forget parking all together and drive down Strand Street into each shop itself. The ultimate door-to-door shopping. Great for accessibility.

The bonus is that, in these circumstances, you don’t even need to battle your moral conscious about whether to add an extra five minutes on your disc because you don’t need to put one up!

The more logical thing to do when it comes to parking spots would be for more of us to use the bus. It’d save money on fuel and cut down our emissions (some of the highest rates of which come from vehicles) helping keep our beautiful little Island from eventually losing Douglas to rising sea levels, which would make parking even more problematic.

‘OH GREAT. THE PROM IS UNDER WATER. NOW WHERE I AM SUPPOSED TO PARK TO GET NOA’S ELVIS PANCAKE STACK?!’

But in a fast-paced world of instant gratification, waiting for a bus then sitting on it with zero control over its speed, can be as painful as searching for a parking space in Douglas.