Charges to be re-introduced after council buys back Wolverhampton city centre car park
Charges will be re-introduced at a city centre car park after a council bought back the site.
City of Wolverhampton Council will begin charging again for parking on the city centre’s St George’s car park to help pay for the area’s multi-million-pound regeneration which includes 370 new homes, shops, offices, community spaces and green streets.
The cheaper charges for Monday to Saturday include £1.50 for up to two hours parking, £2.50 for up to four hours and £4.50 for up to 24 hours.
All-day parking on Sunday would cost £1.50, the council said.
The supermarket in the grade II-listed St George’s Church closed in 2014 when a new £60m supermarket opened half a mile away in Raglan Street.
The council bought the freehold for the St George’s site in 2016 but it had been deemed “surplus to requirements'” by 2023.
Sainsbury’s lease on the site expired in March which returned the ownership and responsibility of the site back to the local authority.
Horizon Parking had continued running the site until August when its own lease expired and the car park has since been free with the council not introducing charges until now.
The council said it will be reviewing car parking charges and is expected to bring St George’s car park in line with prices at its other city centre car parks. The usual price would be £4 for up to four hours – a £1.50 increase – and £8 for up to 12 hours.
But while the car park returned to council ownership in March, the council said it does not have reliable figures to estimate the income for the council the charges would bring.
Since being in charge of the car park since August, the council has not charged for parking on the site and has lost out on potential revenue.
The regeneration of the area around the grade II listed former Sainsbury’s was backed in July by the Labour-run council’s cabinet which included £234,000 within the budget this year to pay for holding the whole St George’s site while development plans are finalised.
This would be paid for using the income generated from the car park itself.
Capital&Centric has been working with City of Wolverhampton Council on designs to turn the five-acres of land at St George’s into a new city centre neighbourhood.
The work is expected to begin at the end of next year and would be ready by spring 2029.
It would feature shops, workspaces and commercial space and would link to the new Wolverhampton College at the £61m City Learning Quarter which opens on Tuesday (November 4).
Last month, the council introduced free parking at the city’s Broad Street car park between 5pm and 5am every day in a bid to boost visitors between now and Christmas.
The council also increased parking charges a year ago which it said would bring in an extra £1m in the face of mounting financial pressure.
Some locations saw prices for an all-day ticket rise from £4.50 to 9.
