BOURTREEHILL’S parking nightmare is still continuing - almost a year after the Irvine Times first exposed the problem.

Sidlaw Crescent resident Morag Niven, 42, previously voiced her concerns about congestion in the street.

She revealed the street was so congested that it would mean that emergency services might not be able to gain access if the need ever arose.

After appealing to her neighbour, Councillor John Easdale, for help, Morag launched a parking campaign to address the situation.

Among her suggestions were for North Ayrshire Council to remove bollards to create more space and even offering to turn her front garden into parking spaces.

However the proposals were rejected by the council, who stated at the time that they believed the proposals would cause confusion between pedestrians and vehicles which could ultimately lead to an accident.

For any meaningful alterations to be made, funding has to come from the housing budget.

Any proposed project is only considered if 50 per cent of more of the residents are North Ayrshire Council tenants. With just one council tenant in Sidlaw Foot, the council were unable to give consideration to the proposals put forward.

Morag said: “This has been ongoing for quite some time.

“The council keep saying that because there is only one council tenant in and there is not a 50/50 ration, their hands are tied. To be honest though, for me, this is actually worse because we all pay full council tax.”

Morag suggested changing the roundabout in her street to allow parking, creating a car park at the back of resident’s homes and removing the bollards and allowing access to gardens.

Morag added: “The infuriating thing is that we have offered solutions to fix this problem by converting our gardens into spaces, at a cost to ourselves, and they still won’t help us. We did offer to foot this bill ourselves. The council have been no help with this”.

Cllr Easdale said: “I see the parking problem every day at my front door in the street where both Mrs Niven and I live, and I also see this as I go about visits to my constituents in other areas.

“When I saw the Estate Based Project details earlier this year, it looked like each of the six areas of Bourtreehill had in excess of 50 per cent council and other housing association tenants, which gets over the hurdle set by the Scottish Government. If it gets the go ahead, it would open the door for other estate areas as well.

“There is little doubt, you would be hard pressed to find any street in a previous council estate in North Ayrshire having more than 50 per cent solely council tenants, which basically means no work to ease parking can be done anywhere.

“It would seem to me the project is now gathering dust on some shelf”.
Cllr Easdale will now write to Elma Murray, the NAC Chief Executive, to ask for an update.

A North Ayrshire Council spokesperson said: “We have been developing feasibility design proposals, as a pilot scheme, to investigate ways to alleviate parking issues in the Bourtreehill area. Road Safety is a key principle in these investigations.

“If there is a suitable and affordable scheme developed and approved to proceed, tenants and local residents will be informed of the final design proposals and likely timescales for completion of the works.

“Unfortunately we feel that Ms Niven’s proposals would cause confusion between pedestrians and vehicles which could ultimately lead to an accident.”