Should ANPR cameras be installed outside schools and other bad driving hotspots in Milton Keynes?

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MK City Council is considering installing Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR) cameras outside schools and other hotspots to deter selfish parkers.

They have this week launched a public consultation on the idea and are inviting everybody in MK to have their say.

The cameras would improve road safety by enabling fixed penalty notices to be issued to drivers committing certain “moving traffic offences”.

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These would include parking on yellow lines or a place where waiting is prohibited, such as outside a school or on a footway.

ANPR cameras could be installed outside some schools in Milton Keynes to punish people who park illegallyANPR cameras could be installed outside some schools in Milton Keynes to punish people who park illegally
ANPR cameras could be installed outside some schools in Milton Keynes to punish people who park illegally

And they could even give the council the power to tow away the vehicles of persistent and repeat parking offenders – and demand a charge before they get them back.

Moving traffic contraventions are generally where a driver ignores a restriction indicated by a traffic sign or road markings. Other examples include driving in a bus or cycle lane, blocking a yellow box junction, driving the wrong way down a one-way street, ignoring a banned turn or no-entry, or disobeying a weight or height restriction.

They do not include speeding.

A spokesperson for MK City Council said: “We would like to do more to improve road safety by taking action against drivers who commit certain moving traffic offences. To do this we will need to introduce a new Traffic Regulation Order (TRO) for the sites where we want to take action.

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"This would give us the legal powers to issue a Penalty Charge Notice (PCN) to drivers who contravene certain types of parking and traffic offences at specified locations by using Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR) cameras.”

The council has already identified sites where they would start in install the cameras and they are inviting people’s views in an official Parking and Moving Traffic Enforcement Consultation.

It lists suggested the sites, which include outside Loughton School, Chestnuts Primary School in Bletchley, New Bradwell School and Holmwood School in Great Holm, as well as certain parts of Central Milton Keynes such as the Midsummer Boulevard/Saxon Gate intersection.

Examples of questions in the survey are:

  1. Would you like to see persistent and repeat parking offenders’ vehicles towed away by the Council so that the offenders have to pay a penalty charge before they can get their vehicles back?
  2. Have you recently been inconvenienced by an illegally parked vehicle, either as a motorist or as a pedestrian or cyclist?
  3. Do you experience regular parking problems where you live, because you live near a school?
  4. Do you think that the safety of school pupils and/or of residents is compromised by the poor parking that occurs around schools
  5. Do you think that the Council is strict enough on drivers who ignore parking regulations?
  6. Have you ever noticed vehicles disobeying traffic restrictions in Milton Keynes, such as ignoring banned turns, cutting queues at junctions by driving up bus lanes, driving the wrong way along one-way streets, ignoring no-entry signs, or blocking yellow box junctions for example?
  7. Do you think that the Council should use cameras to enforce moving traffic restrictions of this sort and send penalty notices to offenders for their illegal and unsafe behaviour?
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