Concerns about parking at the Lister Hospital have been raised at a meeting of the East and North Hertfordshire NHS Trust Board.

The concerns were initially submitted as a petition to Hertfordshire County Council – calling for the Trust to improve parking for staff, visitors and patients at the Stevenage site.

According to that petition there is “not enough parking at the hospital, spaces are “poorly marked” and staff are “regularly fined" by operators Saba.

The petition also claimed that catalytic converters were “often stolen” from cars on the site.
And it suggested the multi-storey car park is “poorly designed” and that this results in “damage to cars”.

At the meeting of the Trust’s Board on Wednesday, May 1, the petition was presented as a “question from the public”.

And in response, chief executive Adam Sewell-Jones highlighted the findings of an independent survey from from a traffic management company.

That survey had considered parking available on the hospital site, on a further site adjacent to the hospital and at ‘the garden centre’. And, he said, it had found that there was “good capacity”.

Nevertheless he acknowledged that parking was a ’cause for concern’. And he outlined ongoing work to improve parking capacity – on and off site.

He highlight ongoing negotiations to secure additional spaces at a site adjacecent to the hospital, as well as the possibility of ‘re-lining’ on the hospital site to create additional spaces.

He highlighted hybrid working and working from home that would impact on the demand for parking spaces.

And he highlighted early-stage negotiations for a shuttle bus service between the hospital and off site parking.

He acknowledged the issue relating to the theft of catalytic converters – with 10 reported as stolen from parked cars in the past two years.

He said the Trust had increased security patrols and that advice had been offered to staff – but he stressed that this was a national problem.

With reference to fines, he said they were issued in line with Trust policy. But he said there was an appeals process and that the Trust did support staff if it was felt that a fine had been unfair.

In response to concerns about the multi-storey, Mr Sewell-Jones said it had been professionally designed, following design guidance.

He referred to 10 accidents reported in a four-month period  – but said the car park was used by 115,000 cars.