Council parking zones in Newry could become family-friendly for the first time amid concerns of “e-scooter threats”.
Councillors have now urged the authority to consider changing bye-laws to put a stop to off-road vehicles with calls to generate ‘mother and baby’ parking bays.
The council’s environment committee approved a draft off-street parking order this week ahead of an expected public consultation later this year.
Crotlieve Sinn Fein Councillor Mickey Ruane said: “There is a concern around specific parking bays for mothers and kids. It is something that is not legislated for. We do have them in shopping centres, but none of our car parks have them.
Is this something that we can actually look at?
“Obviously it would have to be a district wide thing to see if we can provide those parking spaces.”
Parent and child parking bays are wider in size and designed to give parents enough space to move their young children and prams in and out of their cars.
According to Newry, Mourne and Down District Council’s website the authority manages 43 car parks
However, it has publicly stated that does not provide any parent and child car parking spaces stating it is “not legally obligated” to do so.
Mournes DUP Councillor Henry Reilly added: “In years gone by whenever we had problems around anti-social behaviour and drinking in public places like car parks, the council had to enact bye-laws specifically to stop that sort of activity.
“The number of complaints I am sure all councillors are getting is with these e-scooters and scramblers.
“Do we now need specific bye-laws introduced by the council to counter this threat, because it really is a threat they are so dangerous.
“It is really important that we follow up hard on this.”
The council’s active and healthy committee approved a strategy to tackle the “scourge” of off-roaders, including scramblers, e-scooters and quad bikes.
New joint patrols of PSNI officers and community volunteers could look to confiscate the vehicles in order to prevent a further fatal tragedy such as that of Dublin teenager Grace Lynch earlier this year.
In March, Grace’s Law came into effect to ban scramblers from all public spaces in the Republic of Ireland.
In Northern Ireland, scramblers are mostly illegal on public roads and spaces, but are not subject to a blanket ban.
A council officer responded: “The family parking bays are something that we will take on board within the remit of the new parking order.
“I just need to check whether legislatively we can do that at the moment or if we are restricted in some way. I am not actually sure.
“But, the benefits of us having our own parking order in place really gives us the flexibility to do whatever is agreed at council.
“I will follow that up and see how we can bring that forward.”
An officer added:”In respect of the council bye-laws, that is something we need to be discussing with the legal team.
“I do believe there have been discussions at the active and healthy communities committee this week, so I will direct that query through that committee.”
