Town scraps double yellow lines

The council says the yellow lines "blight" Windsor

Double yellow parking lines that "blight" a town in Berkshire are being removed, a council has said.

In what it describes as a "yellow line war", the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead has freed up 170 parking spaces in Windsor to replace the lines.

Residents have spent years parking illegally on the lines but police have not had the resources to effectively tackle the problem, the council said.

Parking enforcement control has now been passed to the council.

This status, issued by the government on 14 January 2008, allows council parking wardens, instead of police officers, to issues tickets.

It's about time councils woke up and thought about the needs of motorists Councillor Tom Bursnall

The lines' removal is part of a £3.15m council project to provide improved street lighting, better road surfaces and more parking in the town.

A council spokesman said the council had begun "an unprecedented campaign to remove double yellow lines that blight [our] town."

It planned "to create hundreds of new parking spaces and spend millions on roads, going against the grain of other local authorities."

One hundred and seventy parking spaces would be freed up across Windsor in the first phase of the project, with the potential to add more later, the spokesperson added.

Conservative party councillors pledged to make the change when they took control of the council in May 2007.

Councillor Tom Bursnall said: "It's about time councils woke up and thought about the needs of motorists.

"Cars are the main form of transport for most families and we have a duty to look after them."