Hospital parking……rant!

In Glasgow, hospital parking is free. We are very fortunate.
On occasions, we do have to pay to park in a local hotel car park. Even then it's stressless.

At our hospital it is relatively easy to pay. Drive in, numberplate recognition, pay contactless by card before you exit. The hard part is finding a space,
DH has an appointment next week. There is a drop off point at the entrance to where he needs to be. Then I have to go and try to park. By the time I have done so, if indeed I can, and then walked back to join him, his appointment might be over. Then I have to go and fetch the car to pick him up. No point actually parking, methinks. I might just as well drive round the campus sooner than try to park. On the other hand he might be ages. Who know.
Without a third person, or another driver, I can’t accompany him to the clinic. Not looking forward to this.

I took a relative to a hospital in Oxfordshire recently and the paperwork recommended scheduling an hour to park the car!
Luckily the clinic we went to was on a Sunday and the hospital was quiet, however there was still very little space.
Number plate recognition and easy to pay on exit though.

As we were early due to the easy parking she was seen 40 minutes early, and we came out as we were due to go in 😀

Our local hospital is bad enough but when my DH had to attend one in Oxford he was told in his appointment letter to allow an hour to park the car and it took every bit of that. We were amazed at the haphazard parking(on yellow lines and in ambulance bays) but I guess people get desperate as their appointment time nears.Paying and exiting was no problem though.

Crossed posts NotAGran. Our experiences were identical. We too got in early for the appointment and were out just after DS found a space. Excellent hospital. Dreadful parking!

Incredible hospital and staff Greenfinch. I was so impressed.

Oxford is difficult I think. My daughter took me there and instead of struggling to get in the car park she managed to find some street parking not too far away. I phoned her when I had finished and she came and picked me up. I think it's better to do that unless you absolutely have to park in the hospital car park. Or if the hospital is nearby maybe get a taxi or bus for a one-off appointment.

I had an appointment at a hospital ten miles from home.
The information letter very strongly recommended using public transport rather than arriving by car, due to the limited parking availability onsite.
It's in the middle of a big industrial estate with no parking in the surrounding roads either.

After stressing about what to do, in the end I pre-booked a taxi. No worries and hassle free.
Afterwards I made my way to the station and came home by train.

Parking at any of our five city hospitals is a nightmare. The biggest of them is now like a small town, and there is never anywhere to park. Toward the end of his life, DH was in this hospital more than he was out, and I’m afraid I used his blue badge shamelessly when I was visiting him, otherwise I would have had to ask someone to drive me there and park off site and anything off site was a good way away. Fortunately the other three are easily accessible for me by public transport.

I have an account with the hospital parking company, they cover both of the hospitals I attend and when I set it up I was at one or other hospital every day. It’s all number plate recognition, we just drive in and drive out and I get a monthly statement. The car parks are busy but we have always been able to find a space.

I have always felt very exasperated by our local hospital. It was built about 10 years ago from scratch. They could have burrowed down and created an underground car park - instead they just plonked it down and left the place with insufficient parking. It is chaos - and could have been avoided with a bit of forethought - but maybe it was money-related - it was PFI funded.

I agree with you Sago, it is a disgrace.
Relatives visiting very sick patients, wanting to stay with very ill children.

All over the hospital were signs telling patients not to discuss or ask staff any aspect of the car parking situation!

It's nothing to do with the staff and they have to pay parking charges as well,- if they can find a space!
My niece came off shift to find she had a parking fine on top of working a stressful shift plus extra hours.

We don't pay car parking charges in Wales but the queue for the car park can be over half an hour sometimes.

At our hospital you get a token at a machine which lifts a barrier to let you in. Before you leave you go to a machine to pay either by card or coins. If you have a relative who is in for a considerable time (like my DH) a few years ago you can get a form from the ward and get free parking till they leave hospital. You have to pay even if you are disabled but at least the disabled parking is on the ground floor.

If Scotland can scrap the charges - why can't we?

I know there are concessions for various groups so they're not penalised for being chronically in need of hospital services - but how much does it cost in Admin to run these concessions?

What really annoys me is the car parks where you have to pay per hour etc in advance of your appointment. Obviously, with the delays that frequently occur you cannot know in advance whether you will be out in 20 minutes, or still there 2 hours later. Nobody wants to rush out of a waiting room to top up a meter so they pay in anticipation of having to wait - often ending up paying for time they haven't used.

This is just wrong - why can't we pay on exit for the time we were there? I always look round for someone to donate my ticket to when this happens to me, and I'm out in good time with more than an hour left on the clock.

It's sharp practise.

I'm not sure how free parking for all works. Don't you get other people just using the car park? Hospitals are all so different in their location, but it might be convenient if the hospital in the town centre.

Just wondering how we managed to get to hospitals in years gone by when few people had a car. Although you weren't allowed to visit very much in those days. It was a case of the patient being dumped there and they were lucky to have a visitor.

Free parking doesn’t help with getting a space. At Inverness we just park in the out of town shopping centre and walk the half mile, it is quicker, even at my slow pace of walking.

Chestnut

I'm not sure how free parking for all works. Don't you get other people just using the car park? Hospitals are all so different in their location, but it might be convenient if the hospital in the town centre.

Just wondering how we managed to get to hospitals in years gone by when few people had a car. Although you weren't allowed to visit very much in those days. It was a case of the patient being dumped there and they were lucky to have a visitor.

There can be a problem with that and the Trust presumably has to fund the cost of the car park attendants too.

But I think it's preferable than making very sick people pay large sums for parking at a hospital.

My husband recently spent two weeks in a hospital in the centre of Bristol with no car park on site. Only NCP car parks available. I spent nearly £200 on parking!!

Knowing I have to get to the hospital with time to spare driving round and round to grab a parking space then the expense and sometimes method of payment does not help at all. As sago has said I too wonder about the stress for others for myself it is bad enough. One day a queue had built up at a machine with a new system because it took ages for one of us to spot the small print on the nearby sign that receipts were not issued, even though the machine itself asked if you wanted a receipt.

Public transport in our area just keeps shrinking, making it impossible to connect even if you have the entire day to travel! A relative is often able to use two buses but then pays for a taxi to return home due to feeling washed out afterwards.

Grannybags

My husband recently spent two weeks in a hospital in the centre of Bristol with no car park on site. Only NCP car parks available. I spent nearly £200 on parking!!

I know where you mean, it is shocking.
I had to go for appointments to the Eye Infirmary nearby years ago and the nearest multi storey car park charged per 20 minutes!!

It’s an absolute disgrace.

The Oxford hospitals are notorious for their dreadful parking. If one of us has an appointment the other goes along too so they can park. Once or twice there hasn’t been a space and OH had to sit in a queue while I had my consultation. The only time I’ve driven myself was when I had appointments at 8 am on a Saturday!

Why not just get a cab to the door? It's either impossible to find a space, very expensive - and/or a whole load of aggravation.

Parking is very expensive at our local hospital IF you are lucky enough to find a space.
As others have said it makes a stressful situation even more stressful.
Most people here use taxis or get someone to drop them off and then ring for a lift back when they are out.