£200k needed to fix parking machines

Exeter City Council is to spend more than £200,000 to make sure ticket machines in two of its main car parks carry on working into 2026.

During a discussion on their budget for the coming months, members of the council heard that a total of £210,000 will have to be spent at the John Lewis and Guildhall car parks because the software which runs the ticket machines won’t work after December 31.

A report to the council explained that funding was required to replace the card and cashless payment machines, barriers and other equipment.

It said: “Given the age, obsolescence and reliability of the current equipment, this is considered a matter of increasing urgency.”

The work is expected to cause ‘minimal disruption’ and should be finished by the end of November.

Cllr Tess Read (Green, St Davids) asked if it was an issue over software ceasing to work after a certain date, similar to the ‘Y2K’ bug which caused some programs to crash straight after December 31 in 1999.

City council finance director Dave Hodgson replied: “They will stop working because the software will no longer be supported by the company. They won’t take payments.”