Motorcycle Parking Policy

The increased use of motorcycles in London presents a series of challenges to the City Council. Whilst the ‘footprint’ of a motorcycle is considerably smaller than that of a car, motorcycles still use road space when driving or parking.  The City Council’s policy on charges for motorcycle parking reflects their use of these limited resources. 

Our policy to charge for motorcycle parking reflects the demands made on Westminster’s infrastructure by the increasing numbers of people using motorcycles and scooters.  Our approach attempts to fairly balance the finite amount of kerbside provision between all the different motorist types and uses and our policy reflects motorcyclists’ use of these limited resources and their increasing demand for them. Overall we believe the policy is fair, reasonable and informed.

In recognition of the lower impact of motorcycles on road and kerb space, the charge to park a motorcycle in a motorcycle bay is significantly less than the equivalent charge for a car in a paid-for parking place. The charge to park in a motorcycle bay does not apply to holders of a residents' permit for a motorcycle. It is free for motorcycles to park in dedicated off-street motorcycle bays in our car parks.

Prior to the launch of the charging scheme in August 2008, the number of motorcycle parking bays in the City was increased by 44%, from 4,500 to 6,550 bays, including approximately 400 in the City Council’s secure car parks. In June 2009 we increased off-street provision to over 1,000 spaces although some of these newer spaces were subsequently lost in September 2009 as a result of the removal of two car parks from the City Council's portfolio.

It is acknowledged that the motorcycle scheme initially raised significantly more revenue from permits than had been forecast.  We therefore reduced the charges for motorcycle parking from 1 June 2009 by approximately one-third, gave concessions to residents' permit holders whereby their residents' permit allows them to park in motorcycle bays city-wide without further charge and made off-street dedicated motorcycle bays in our car parks free of charge. Furthermore the implementation of the permanent traffic orders on 25 January 2010 saw the price of a residents' permit for a motorcycle reduce to £50 per annum regardless of engine size and in April 2010 we introduced 'virtual' electronic resident's permits for motorcycles.