Making waves: Team work, a commitment to training and a willingness to embrace innovative ideas are hallmarks of Bournemouth Borough Council's parking team

摘要

Holidaymakers, residents, business people and pole dancers are just some of the people that Bournemouth Borough Council's parking team has to look after, Bournemouth has a resident population of around 170,000, but as a beach resort it attracts more than four million visitors between April and October every year. Hence the council is even more wary than most of generating bad publicity that could spoil the town's lucrative tourism industry. So, rather than bring in an outside contractor, the council opted to run its parking enforcement in-house. There are around 50 car parks across the borough comprising 10,000 spaces variously used for commuter, shopping and leisure purposes. With casinos and clubs remaining open until the early hours of the morning, some of the council's car parks are frequented 24 hours a day. "I've even on one occasion had to advise a pole dancer on the safest place to leave her car - something which perhaps not many parking managers can claim!" says Gerry Boliand, Bournemouth's enforcement and parking manager.