Member's statement: South Belfast: Residents' Parking Schemes

Member's statement by Mr Matthew O'Toole on 9 June 2026.

MLA

Mr Matthew O'Toole

Party at the time

Social Democratic and Labour Party

Date

9 June 2026

Type

Member's statement

Business

Members' Statements

Heading

South Belfast: Residents' Parking Schemes

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 5601523

Read the official Assembly record

Text

I rise to raise an issue that is very important in South Belfast, particularly in the inner part of South Belfast. It relates to the residents' parking scheme, which is open to applications at the minute. It opened at the end of April and will run until the end of July. A successful pilot scheme has been operating for a number of years at Rugby Road. That has been extended by the Minister. We welcomed the principle of extending it to other parts of Northern Ireland, when Minister Kimmins announced it, but, at that time, I made the point that the levels of response required — an overall majority of occupants in a street in support of an application for a residents' parking zone — would specifically discriminate against many of the parts of my constituency that are most in need of residents' parking schemes and which, frankly, are crying out for them. I am thinking in particular of areas such as Stranmillis, the Holylands and parts of the lower Lisburn Road where people want residents' parking schemes. I say this for the benefit of the people who walk around them: those are the areas for which the schemes are most essential, because they experience high numbers of people who want to use the local amenities, but, because of their proximity to the city centre, people often park there for commuting purposes. The residents have to deal with that extra burden and challenge, because, in those places, off-street parking is rare — in fact, it is almost non-existent in some areas. The people who live in those areas really want a residents' parking scheme. The Rugby Road scheme has happened in the same part of the inner south of the city, but the system is almost designed to discriminate against residents. A high number of people who live there have short-term lets, or they are students or people who are relatively transitory. That means that it is almost impossible, if not impossible, to get a majority of people in some of those streets in that part of Belfast to respond. That is creating a challenge. It would be a huge regret for the Executive and the Minister if the areas, streets and neighbourhoods in inner Belfast that are most crying out for residents' parking schemes were unable to benefit from the scheme, in part because of the way in which the scheme is set up. Surely, that is not a desirable situation. I ask the Minister to look at the issue again. The applications for the scheme run until the end of July. There is active representation from groups such as the Stranmillis Neighbourhood Association. It works hard and is doing huge amounts of work to bring its community together through various community projects, including planting in alleyways.

They want the absolute best for their community, and a residents' parking scheme would be a huge bonus for them, albeit they want a scheme that works for them and for the inner south Belfast communities. I hope that the Minister will look again at the way in which the scheme operates.

520 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

Not flagged

Jev’s structured answers

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 15:47 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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