al78 wrote:I To provide car parks and maintain them costs someone money, so why shouldn't the users pay a small charge.
I think that everyone understands that it costs money to build and maintain car parks, and most people are probably happy to contribute. However, are these charges in any way related to the true economic cost of maintaining the facility or is it just profiteering?
It's not really fair to compare with city centre car parks because the costs in a city centre are likely to be higher, and because part of the reason for charging is to try and discourage people from driving into city centres and encouraging public transport use.
Given that this car park is only about an hour's drive from Glasgow and is at the start of some really good walks, I suspect that this will put some people off. It's unlikely to deter people who are already keen hillwalkers (they'll either put up with it or go elsewhere), but I suspect there are quite a few people for whom it's their first taste of hillwalking and they might not even make the first step.