Complaint from dad sparks city centre car park clean-up
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A MAJOR city centre car park has been branded a health hazard by a dad who said he had to negotiate a host of broken bottles and even human waste there.
Kevin Cuthbert (41), who lives in Grantown-on-Spey, contacted the Inverness Courier last week to say he had run into problems at the two-storey open air car park in Rose Street more than once while visiting the city with his young son.
“It’s a handy car park and because of the truck I drive it’s the only one accessible to me because I’m above the height restriction for the neighbouring multi-storey,” he said.
“But it’s just a complete mess.
“There is just so much litter there including broken bottles, even bottles full of urine, plus human faeces right next to the ticket machine.
“It’s unacceptable when you have small children in tow to have to purchase a ticket just inches away from something like that.
“You have to wonder what kind of impression this creates for visitors who might experience this as among their first sights when they come to Inverness.”
The site is owned by Inverness Properties which last month admitted a sharp fall in demand had killed off its previous plans to build up to 100 student flats on the site.
Declaring the plans “on hold” it instead submitted a scheme to redevelop the neighbouring Rose Street Halls as a new retail space.
The car park will also be levelled as part of that scheme, and replaced with a ground-level open-air parking space instead.
Owner Charlie Barbour said that plan remained on track, while work to tidy the existing car park up was carried out after the Courier contacted him about it.
“We are certainly aware of this as a problem site, which it can be difficult to keep clean just because of the nature of it being so open,” he said.
“We have had various anti-social behaviour problems there and there were previous complaints about ‘boy racers’ using the site at night, creating a lot of noise as well as dropping litter.
“In response to those complaints we put a barrier up for when the car park is closed at night but of course it’s basically impossible to prevent people on foot accessing the car park if they really want.
“We are aware that others are congregating there too and have raised that as an issue with the appropriate authorities.
“The plan is still very much that in the near future this car park will be demolished and the new facility that will it take its place will be much more open and, on that basis, easier to police. There will be more lighting and it will also be covered by CCTV which should hopefully discourage anyone from behaving improperly there.”
Mr Barbour said he fully recognised the state of the car park as brought to the Courier’s attention by Mr Cuthbert was “unacceptable.”
“That is why we have taken immediate action to get it cleaned,” he said.
“As I said, it is a difficult site to manage but we will certainly be keeping a close eye on it in the future ahead of demolition.”
He said he hoped demolition would take place before the beginning of June.
The Courier visited the car park on Wednesday last week, after Mr Cuthbert’s call.
At that time, as our pictures show, it was covered in rubbish including empty cans, beer bottles and broken glass.
Returning on Friday afternoon things seemed much improved though, after contract staff had apparently spent a whole day clearing away the litter there.
Inverness Central councillor, Richard Laird, said the city centre car park was one of the area’s most “notorious” spots for anti-social behaviour.
“Being on two storeys, poorly lit and covered so that it’s fairly sheltered from watchful eyes it is a site that has proved attractive to certain types of people engaging in certain types of activity for a long time,” he said.
“I know it had been sold to developers by the council on the basis that the site was going to be used for new student housing and the fact that that development is not now going ahead is quite disappointing.
“That said even the fact that it looks like the current structure is going to be replaced with another parking facility is something I definitely welcome.
“The fact that it is on two storeys is what creates so many of the problems.
“I think a car park that is more open and better lit would be a major improvement on what is there at the moment and I look forward to that taking shape as soon as possible.”
