Why do hospitals, most of whom have large catchment areas, make accessing them so difficult?

twaddle

Luckygirl3

When they were building a brand new children’s hospital in Oxford in the plan was a large underground car park.

This is what bugged me when our new hospital was built - they had a clean slate and could have installed an underground car park as the first action, especially as the hospital is in a built-up area with no parking nearby. Staff have the same problem every day. It is not just patients.

What stopped them? Cost?

Presumably - it was one of these PFI initiatives.

I think the thing to do is find out if any help is available by ringing the hospital or looking at their website.

Then contacting the CEO of the hospital and expressing concerns. Also there is usually a patients group, to talk to.
Also write to your MP and local newspaper or Facebook.
There's 2 aspects finding help for yourself and improving the situation generally.

I think so much depends on where you live and the type of treatment you are receiving. I really can't complain any more about the parking when we go to the hospital twice a week. Like M0nica attending by public transport would take hours with changes in both directions.

The hospital has two huge paid car parks and some smaller ones for staff and they are always queued back. We are lucky to be able to use a smaller one that is free for cancer treatments. A few times we nearly missed a treatment because we couldn't park. Then they installed name plate recognition cameras in the car parks and you had to register your car when you go for treatment, and lo and behold suddenly we could park. We get parking permits to park, and people were using them to park in the oncology car park to go into town on the bus (10 minute journey). I suspect that there is also a problem with the paid car park, as it it still cheaper than town centre parking and without the grief of driving through the centre of a very busy town.

JaneJudge

my husband also has a severe heart condition. I have to take time off work and drive to drop him off at the door and on a few occasions haven't been able to par either, so he's had to go in alone and then i pick him up when he gets out. I don't know what would happen if I couldn't do this or her needs a wheelchair at any point

I'm sorry I'm no help. I feel a bit sad today about everything and I don't know what we would do if I couldn't do this fortnightly. Work are being ok atm but you know what companies are like

I don't know if we would qualify for a blue badge but all the disabled spaces are taken up too

I feel your pain Monica

DO go get a blue badge. Yes my local hospital has a whole car park for blue badge holders which is nearly always full, but you can park pretty much anywhere with it, and they do.

AmberGran

I think so much depends on where you live and the type of treatment you are receiving. I really can't complain any more about the parking when we go to the hospital twice a week. Like M0nica attending by public transport would take hours with changes in both directions.

The hospital has two huge paid car parks and some smaller ones for staff and they are always queued back. We are lucky to be able to use a smaller one that is free for cancer treatments. A few times we nearly missed a treatment because we couldn't park. Then they installed name plate recognition cameras in the car parks and you had to register your car when you go for treatment, and lo and behold suddenly we could park. We get parking permits to park, and people were using them to park in the oncology car park to go into town on the bus (10 minute journey). I suspect that there is also a problem with the paid car park, as it it still cheaper than town centre parking and without the grief of driving through the centre of a very busy town.

Do check; when I was doing the chemo runs with my mum, I parked in a special car park, but if that was full, I could take my ticket to oncology reception and they would validate it for free parking.

Because our hospital car park is expensive, we do not have the trouble of no space because people arrive on time and go as quickly as possible to avoid the extra payment

I attended Royal Papworth last week. They gave me a reduced parking fee by showing my wristband.

The staff were keen to tell me about the new station due to open. There will be an hourly service from Ely through Cambridge, and this will link to the Oxford/Cambridge line that is being built. It already has a shuttle to the park & ride and excellent cycle ways.

One of the issues that has made this worse is that, when building new hospitals, they knock down the town centre hospital and rebuild out on the fringe of the town, which means much worse public transport.
My local hospital is a long journey for me by bus. There are other hospitals easier to get to but they are in a different borough so we do not get referrals there.

Elusivebutterfly

One of the issues that has made this worse is that, when building new hospitals, they knock down the town centre hospital and rebuild out on the fringe of the town, which means much worse public transport.
My local hospital is a long journey for me by bus. There are other hospitals easier to get to but they are in a different borough so we do not get referrals there.

In fairness I don’t think that town centres have enough acreage to build new hospitals on, so the choice of sites which are big enough must be quite restricted? The provision of good public transport to get people to the new sites is vital.

With reference to Casdon/Elusivebutterfly post.

If hospitals build on large rural sites and I uite see why this happens, they should provide sufficient car parking. Most people going to a hospital are old or ill or both.

Many cannot cope with long bus journeys including changes then waiting round for return bus that will take as long on the return journey. These are not people who ualify for free transport. They will be people lke my DH who potters uite happily round our local town , doing shopping, stopping for coffee, going to the doctor etc, but would find a journey like the one I have described simply too exhausting, but that is the journey he would have if he tried to get to two of our local hospitals by bus,

For many people coming from smaller towns and villages, further out, the public transport journey, if public transport there be, the journeywill be longer and more arduous.

I agree M0nica, for new hospitals that should happen. Most hospitals though are not new, and have parking that was perhaps adequate forty or fifty years ago when they were built, but is not now. so there are no easy solutions. Park and rides do work well if they are properly organised.