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Parking

How parking is regulated


We are responsible for enforcing the on-street parking restrictions and have additional powers to enforce moving traffic contraventions across the County but not those in Plymouth or Torbay. Our civil enforcement officers (CEOs) patrol most principal roads daily.  As a driver, it’s your responsibility to abide with all restrictions associated to road use, to check your parking place for any restrictions, and where required to make sure payment has been made for any digital parking session or permit required and any physical ticket or permit is clearly displayed on the dashboard of your vehicle.

If you are unsure where to park:

Waiting and parking regulations are enforced through traffic regulation orders (TROs).

Most TROs are introduced to address specific traffic-related issues, for example, congestion, air quality, or impact to quality of life to nearby occupiers.

These are written legal agreements developed and approved in consultations with the residents, their councillors, the police and district councils to ensure a safe, free flow of traffic, to address the issues and improve the circumstances via effective parking management.

Devon County Council is a member of the Parking and Traffic Regulations Outside London (PATROL) Adjudication Joint Committee. PATROL provides information about parking tickets, how to pay them and how to challenge them.

Since April 2014 Devon County Council has provided an in-house on-street service, you can find out how our service has performed and how the revenue raised has been used in the reports below:

The way money is spent is agreed annually by the Cabinet and is published in our County Road Highway Maintenance Revenue Budget and On-street Parking Account.

Statistics

We publish our parking ticket statistics showing how many tickets have been issued in each town. These figures are always published in arrears.

Civil Enforcement Officers (CEOs)

CEOs or traffic wardens as many still refer to them, enforce parking and moving traffic restrictions using powers issued by the Secretary of State under regulations within the Traffic Management Act 2004.

Our enforcement hours are mostly focused around business hours of 8am to 6pm, but as some restrictions apply at all times, we do frequently plan patrols between 6am and 8pm and also make additional visits to cover periods earlier or later than this. This allows enforcement cover for deploying officers for up to 12 hours on any given day in our resident permit zones, event parking strategies, and in response to customer feedback or complaints to tackle overnight parking issues in areas with at any time restrictions.

CEOs patrol all streets with pay and display parking, double yellow lines and other parking restrictions, as well as some off-street car parks e.g. Stover Country Park. We check whether cars are parked appropriately and issue Penalty Charge Notices (parking tickets) to vehicles we believe to be parked in contravention of the traffic regulation orders.

CEOs have limited powers to enforce against vehicles parked on a pavement or verge, and no powers to remove a vehicle blocking or restricting a private driveway. We can issue a parking ticket when a vehicle is parked across a driveway stopping a resident from leaving the property, but not when a vehicle is stopping a resident from entering.

The police still have enforcement powers to deal with obstruction offences and dangerously parked vehicles and they can get an offending vehicle removed.

If you believe a vehicle has been abandoned you can check if that vehicle is taxed and has an MOT at Check if a vehicle is taxed – GOV.UK . If it has neither removal is the responsibility of the local District or City Council.

Once a parking ticket has been issued the CEO cannot withdraw or cancel it. You must challenge the ticket in writing. Details on how to are shown on the rear of the ticket issued.

Zero tolerance – abusive or aggressive behaviour

Civil enforcement officers (CEOs) have a difficult but important job in ensuring the highway is clear and safe for all users. Whilst we appreciate nobody wants to receive a PCN fine, nevertheless our staff still deserve to be treated with courtesy and respect.

At Devon County Council, we have an Unacceptable Behaviour policy. This means that inappropriate, aggressive or violent behaviour towards any of our staff will not be tolerated under any circumstances. Our CEOs and other officers with public facing roles now wear body cameras for their protection. These devices will be activated if that officer feels that a situation is escalating and that behaviours towards them is no longer acceptable.

We understand that you may not agree with our enforcement, however, we feel sure that you will understand that unacceptable behaviour is not the solution. If you have feedback on the conduct or behaviour of a team member please let us know.

Anyone demonstrating these behaviours towards any of the Parking Enforcement team or Parking Appeals team staff may be sent a letter advising that this behaviour will not be tolerated. Any future violation of this policy will result in the police being informed.

Report a parking problem or request parking enforcement

You can now report concerns about a parking problem or request parking enforcement using our online service.

Please be advised that we do cannot offer a callout response service, if an officer is currently working in the area they will be asked to visit during their patrol.  All requests and information we receive is used by the local managers when planning future patrols and enforcement times.

Parking services privacy notice

Devon County Council (DCC) will act as a ‘data controller’ for any personal data that you provide to us via an appeal against a PCN or parking permit application. As such, we will ensure that the data given us is processed in line with our organisation’s data protection policies and in line with your rights under the Data Protection Act 2018 and UK General Data Protection Regulations. To find out more about how DCC will use your personal data, you can read our Parking services privacy notice.