DRIVERS visiting Coleford this week met new sights to add to their parking woes – the previously free car-park by the Co-op has had many bays painted with blue edging and the warning 'LPS Permit Holders Only'.

The new parking bays – which were almost all empty when visited last Thursday evening – are also accompanied by new metal signs affixed to the walls around the car park. These read: "Private Parking. LPS Permit Holders In Blue Bays. Permits must be displayed. Excess charge £60."

The text beneath this banner headline detailed the new regime: "If you park on this land contravening the above parking restrictions you are agreeing to pay a parking charge in the sum of £60 (or the reduced sum of £40 if paid within 14 days). If excess charge payments are not received within 14 days we will apply to the DVLA for the registered keeper's details.

"This car park is privately owned and is managed on behalf of the landowners by Local Parking Security Ltd."

Confused motorists, on reading the signs, tried in vain to find a machine that they could buy a ticket, but unlike the main car park, the smaller one outside the Co-op is not now a 'pay and display', and is solely for those who hold a permit for that particular car park.

A call to the Forest of Dean District Council to elicit whether the change from a free to a revenue raising car park was allowed drew a blank, as their Planning Department has passed the new changes and have said that they do not constitute any infringement of planning regulations.

However, a spokeswoman did confirm that the new blue spaces were those owned by Clive Bath of property development company Dean Properties.

But for shoppers, it adds another element to the bewildering parking saga that has beset Coleford since the District Council imposed their own pay and display sections to the area.

The Review understands the blue bays are in fact to be kept as private parking by the landlords, Dean Properties Ltd. Managing director Clive Bath told us: "We, as landlords of various shops and flats in Coleford, have created these new bays for our tenants. The permits will not be available to the public."

The manager of the Co-op supermarket in Coleford, outside which many new blue bays are sited, declined to comment at the time of going to press.