London coach parking
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Your article on the parlous state of coach parking in London (CM August 8) was most timely. It is a matter of regret that we have to wait for a GLC survey of the situation before any improvement can be effected. It is surely obvious that the coach parking problem is so acute that immediate action, albeit on an emergency or temporary basis, is required.
In the longer term, the London Tourist Board and its overlord the English Tourist Board will have to take a much closer interest in matters like coach parking. If only a fraction of the E18,149,068 given by the Tourist Board in hotel grants in the London area since 1969 had been devoted to tourist coach parking there would now be no problem.
It must be appreciated by all that providing for the parking of coaches cannot be done on the cheap. Higher parking charges are perhaps easier to recover from passengers than lower ones. The operator hesitates to place a surcharge of lp or 2p to cover parking costs and so will absorb present expenditure on parking into his general running costs. Higher parking costs calling for a passenger surcharge of 5p or 10p per head could more readily be passed on directly to the passenger.
It is fortunate for the tourist industry that coach drivers are, in the main, easy going and adaptable individualists. It is not difficult to imagine the attitude of militant industrial workers faced with a similar combination of officialdom and inadequacies to that found on the London tourist circuit. A coach driver who is unable to relax, obtain refreshment or even answer the calls of nature because he cannot leave his coach for a few minutes will not be able to give of his best, either driving or looking after the needs of his passengers.
B. CLAYTON, East Midland regional chairman, CMS, Leicester.