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E-bike Pilot Scheme Bearing Fruit for Parking Officers

Cynllun Peilot Beiciau Trydan yn Dwyn Ffrwyth i Swyddogion Parcio

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Gymraeg

A pilot scheme to assess the usefulness of e-bikes by some Powys County Council and Powys Teaching Health Board staff is already bearing fruit for some of the council's parking enforcement officers.

This initiative has seen a small number of council and health board front-line staff supplied with e-bikes to assess their value. The e-bikes have been purchased from Powys bike shops using funding from Welsh Government.

The staff that cover the north east of the county have been on duty to try and help manage the parking of the heavy numbers of motorists to Pistyll Rhaeadr waterfalls and have been using e-bikes in their work. This summer has seen large numbers of visitors taking advantage of the good weather to, understandably, make a visit to the falls. Recent weekends have seen visitors parking on residents' lawns as the available parking has been full.

The council's Civil Enforcement Officers are using e-bikes to navigate areas where traffic is sometimes gridlocked.

Damian Perkins is Lead Civil Enforcement Officer with the council and he explained:

“The road to the falls is quite narrow and on days where there are a lot of visitors it's not uncommon to see gridlock, often due to people parking inconsiderately.”

“My colleagues have been able to park their cars in Llanrhaeadr ym Mochnant and then cycle the last four miles, using the folding e-bikes, to the falls to check for inconsiderate parking. If they'd driven up, they too would have been stuck in the traffic but with e-bikes they can easily get through to the source of the problem,” he explained.

“”Our Officers are not there just to issue tickets, they often find themselves taking on an educational role. Educating drivers on inconsiderate parking often works as a preventative measure to ensure the safer flow of traffic,”

The e-bikes have been purchased (from Powys bike shops) using grant funding from Welsh Government.

Councillor Heulwen Hulme is the council's Cabinet Member with responsibility for Highways. She commented:

“We are really grateful to the Welsh Government for this funding which is allowing us to investigate which roles within the council that e-bikes can prove useful to staff in their day-to-day work.”

“We've recently introduced our first electric refuse lorry and with initiatives like this we can help to reduce our carbon footprint, “added Cllr. Hulme.

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