Parking at St Oswald’s Hospital and Long Eaton Health Centre
Those of you who are based at either St Oswald’s Hospital or Long Eaton Health Centre will be aware of plans by car park operators CHP to introduce monitored permit parking on site in the New Year.
It means all DCHS staff who attend, or who are based at these sites, will need to adhere to the new regulations or risk incurring a £100 fine. NPC (National Parking Control) will monitor parking on behalf of CHP. The car parks will be warden monitored.
CHP has given us a limited number of permits at both sites to allocate to DCHS teams in the fairest way possible. Inevitably, this has not been easy, with demand outstripping permit supply. The allocation of parking permits has been done on the basis of permits for teams or services rather than named individuals, and it has been overseen by the DCHS’ Site Optimisation Group to be as fair as possible.
You can see the allocations here.
The enforcement of the permits for on-site parking at Long Eaton Health Centre and St Oswald’s Hospital starts on Monday 13 January 2025. It will apply seven days a week and potentially could be monitored 24 hours a day with an exception at St Oswald’s Hospital to enable night/out-of-hours staff to park on-site in staff parking bays regardless of whether they have a permit. This is for safety reasons.
It will be the responsibility of DCHS service managers and team leaders to decide how best to utilise the permit(s) allocated to their team(s). CHP permits are not linked to individual car registration numbers and can be transferred between team members. The daily use or transfer of CHP permits must be for each team to manage within their allocation. IFM colleagues will not be involved in this process for other teams.
While we know that CHP will be strict about monitoring the correct use of staff parking bays during working hours Monday – Friday, there is still the possibility that CHP will monitor parking over weekends and so you should be displaying a permit to park in a staff bay seven days a week. For the safety of out-of-hours staff at St Oswald’s, permits will not be required to park in staff parking bays at the hospital overnight, between 6pm and 7.30am.
National Parking Control (NPC) signage is already up at both sites about the parking regulations. NPC is working on behalf of CHP to monitor the parking regulations. If anyone breaks the regulations NPC will issue an initial warning and after the warning a £100 penalty notice will be issued to the registered car owner at their home address. Penalties will be issued for incorrect parking in staff bays and for parking in non-staff bays and in areas which are not designated for parking under NPC regulations, such as on red lines or verges.
There are two drop-off/pick-up loading bay spaces at both St Oswald’s Hospital and Long Eaton Health Centre. These can be used without a permit. The time limit is 30 minutes.
Yes, these are the regulations which CHP has issued and which have initiated this more detailed comms so DCHS colleagues are as prepared as possible:
Parking off site
The following guidance is offered to colleagues who need to be on site and who do not have a parking permit. We have listed all known alternative parking facilities within reasonable walking distance of both sites. If you think we have missed any please contact the communications team so it can be added to the online list: dchst.communications@nhs.net.
- Parking for two hours or less? Both the Clifton Road and Leisure Centre car parks in Ashbourne charge £2.50 for two hours parking. This is the standard Derbyshire County Council rate for their car parks.
- Parking all day? The current all-day fee for parking at Clifton Road and the Leisure Centre is £6 daily.
- Looking for alternatives? Parkopedia website gives you the locations and costs of all the parking options in Ashbourne: Ashbourne parking - Car Parks, Street Parking, Private Garages
- Free parking on Mayfield Road? This is about a five-minute walk through the churchyard. A possible alternative in the right circumstances if you want a short walk.
- On site for less than three hours? Asda, Midland Street – up to three hours free parking, for colleagues who are going in and out of base.
- Just picking up/dropping off? You can use the two loading bays for a maximum of 30 minutes without a permit. You must be within the loading bays and not in any other area of the car park.
- On site for a full day or based on site all the time? Download the Horizon parking app: Park with Horizon Parking. This will enable you to book a parking space at Asda or any other participating parking provider in Long Eaton at a reduced fee. CHP has arranged for 30 spaces at Asda via Horizon Parking at a reduced fee. The reduced daily rate is £3 (usually £3.50) or £40+VAT monthly (usually £46+VAT) - using the Horizon app. Once VAT is added the reduced monthly rate is £48.
- Are Asda permits transferrable between colleagues? No, the permits work on car registration plates and ANPR monitoring.
- Looking for other alternatives? Please see the map on this line for other options, from Parkopedia: Long Eaton parking - Car Parks, Street Parking, Private Garages
Any parking charges incurred during working hours while attending St Oswald’s Hospital or Long Eaton Health Centre for work, are fully refundable and will be reimbursed. Reimbursement will be via your Easy Pay expenses. Or parking can be reimbursed via petty cash by agreement with your line manager. Petty cash floats held at each site have been increased to enable this to be paid. DCHS is committed to the promise that staff will not be out of pocket for parking for work.
It’s an audit requirement that any requests for reimbursement of money should be accompanied by an original receipt, however we appreciate that’s not always easy. Parking apps have the facility to obtain a receipt by logging into your account, viewing your bookings and within here you should have the option to print/email a receipt. If this proves difficult we can look into the viability of accepting screenshots.