Disc, voucher and meter parking zones

[PTR 444]

I was up in the North of England earlier this month and came across several road signs mentioning a “Disc Zone”. From the signs, it is obvious that they a form of parking restriction, but what makes Disc Zones unique is that parking is enforced by drivers displaying a “disc” (piece of card with spinning circle) with the time they arrived.

We didn’t park up in one so I have limited knowledge, but I read up that discs can be purchased in local shops upon parking, while some local authorities will allow you to use the same one on repeat occasions. I guess the advantage of using these instead of pay and display machines is that they are cheaper to manufacture in lightly visited areas, but the main issue I see is that someone could go back to their car and change the time on the disc to grant themselves more free parking time.

I also subsequently read up on Voucher Parking zones, which seem largely similar except you display a voucher rather than a disc, and Meter Zones which use traditional parking meters (different from pay & display machines as each space is allocated its own) but are a rarity these days. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a sign for one outside of the Highway Code.

Are there any parking experts on here who might be able to elaborate on these different zone types, including pros and cons of each? Also would be keen to find out if there are particular reasons why one type of zone might be used over another.

 

[PeterC]

I have a Scarborough DC disc which I obtained (free) when the scheme was implemented in Whitby. Discs and vouchers were used in the same zones for shirt/medium stay and long term parking respectively. Whitby, of course, has many old style boarding houses with no off street parking. Typically the owners buy the vouchers and issue them to their guests.

The complexity of obtaining discs mean that they favour locals and regular year-on-year attendees at the town's various goth and music festivals

 

[swt_passenger]

I was up in the North of England earlier this month and came across several road signs mentioning a “Disc Zone”. From the signs, it is obvious that they a form of parking restriction, but what makes Disc Zones unique is that parking is enforced by drivers displaying a “disc” (piece of card with spinning circle) with the time they arrived.

We didn’t park up in one so I have limited knowledge, but I read up that discs can be purchased in local shops upon parking, while some local authorities will allow you to use the same one on repeat occasions.

I have a Northumberland disc, I must have had it in the car for 4 or 5 years now, as far as I know it doesn’t expire, and I‘m pretty sure it was free when I first got it.

I guess the advantage of using these instead of pay and display machines is that they are cheaper to manufacture in lightly visited areas, but the main issue I see is that someone could go back to their car and change the time on the disc to grant themselves more free parking time.

That’s a risk they‘ve been happy to accept with blue badge users ever since they came in.

 

[CarrotPie]

I was up in the North of England earlier this month and came across several road signs mentioning a “Disc Zone”. From the signs, it is obvious that they a form of parking restriction, but what makes Disc Zones unique is that parking is enforced by drivers displaying a “disc” (piece of card with spinning circle) with the time they arrived.

We didn’t park up in one so I have limited knowledge, but I read up that discs can be purchased in local shops upon parking, while some local authorities will allow you to use the same one on repeat occasions. I guess the advantage of using these instead of pay and display machines is that they are cheaper to manufacture in lightly visited areas, but the main issue I see is that someone could go back to their car and change the time on the disc to grant themselves more free parking time.

I also subsequently read up on Voucher Parking zones, which seem largely similar except you display a voucher rather than a disc, and Meter Zones which use traditional parking meters (different from pay & display machines as each space is allocated its own) but are a rarity these days. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a sign for one outside of the Highway Code.

Are there any parking experts on here who might be able to elaborate on these different zone types, including pros and cons of each? Also would be keen to find out if there are particular reasons why one type of zone might be used over another.

They're very common here in Finland, and, for that matter, in the rest of Europe too. They're much cheaper to maintain than meters, because every car has one, you can use them everywhere and besides, they're only a few euro. Yes, someone can change the time, but why would you do that? Well, I supoose it is the UK...

 

[Gemz91]

Saw these two years ago in Hexham. From memory the car park was split up into three separate coloured zones. We spent about 20 minutes reading the rules, think we eventually realised they didn’t apply on Sundays. They weren’t the most clear rules for out of towners, think if it was during the week and the parking restrictions were enforced I’d have spent the entire day worried I’d not followed the instructions correctly and that I was going to get a parking ticket.