Having recently called for urgent action to resolve car parking chaos at hospital sites across North Wales, Leader of the Welsh Conservatives and Clwyd West MS Darren Millar has welcomed a commitment by the health board to look at reinstating a park and ride facility to serve Ysbyty Glan Clwyd. 

The park and ride scheme operated from the former Hotpoint factory site in Bodelwyddan to Glan Clwyd Hospital between October 2014 and June 30 2019 and was used by thousands of patients.

Darren has been pressing the Health Board to introduce additional parking facilities at their hospital sites for a number of years, and requested an update from the Chair of the Health Board during a recent meeting.

He recently received a letter from Dyfed Edwards, Chair of Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board (BCUHB), which revealed that plans to revive the Park and Ride scheme are being explored.

The letter, dated March 10, states: "The Hospital Management Team has established a Traffic Management Group to explore both immediate and long-term solutions to address the on-site parking challenges. This includes the feasibility of re-establishing a Park and Ride or Park and Walk options within the local Bodelwyddan area. Clearly, this will depend on our ability to secure parking provision within the local community that can be used to support such a service.” 

The letter also referred to the fact that, as a result of a number of containers having now been cleared and relocated, an additional 28 car parking spaces have been created at the Glan Clwyd site.

Commenting,  Darren said: 

“While any increase in the availability of parking is welcome, 28 spaces is woefully inadequate and is unlikely to address the challenges that staff, patients and their loved ones are facing.

“The previous park and ride arrangements worked well so it would be good if the health board could explore a similar arrangement once again.

“There were plans at one point for a multi-storey car park at Glan Clwyd Hospital. While this would be an ideal solution, it would also be very expensive and mean that less money would be available for investing in hospitals. Given this a new park and ride seems to be the best option in the short term.”

When the park and ride was operational, Darren called for it to be made available for the staff, freeing up parking for patient on the site.