Truck Parking & National Planning Policy

  • By MDS Transmodal
  • •
  • 11 Dec, 2018

A new planning policy on truck parking has been introduced by the Government in its National Planning Policy Framework, requiring both local government and the private sector developers of new distribution parks to make provision for adequate parking for HGVs off the public highway.

On long distance trunk hauls lorry drivers have to find a location to park up to rest or for an overnight stay, while Motorway Service Areas (MSAs) are expensive and only offer a limited number of spaces for HGV parking. Hauliers are required to make deliveries and collections within specific time slots –often with penalties included in their contracts if the slots are missed - which means that the drivers arrive early and park up on the public highway. For these reasons HGVs can be parked in locations on or adjacent to the public highway, sometimes leading to complaints from local residents.  

In July 2018 the Government published its revised National Planning Policy Framework which provides planning guidance for local planning authorities in England on what should be considered when producing their development plans. For the first time the guidance directly addresses the issue of lorry parking and places the onus on local authorities to plan for lorry parking provision in appropriate locations and on the private sector to provide sufficient parking provision at distribution centres.  

Paragraph 107 states that: Planning policies and decisions should recognise the importance of providing adequate overnight lorry parking facilities, taking into account any local shortages, to reduce the risk of parking in locations that lack proper facilities or could cause a nuisance. Proposals for new or expanded distribution centres should make provision for sufficient lorry parking to cater for their anticipated use.

The inclusion of a requirement for distribution centres to have ‘sufficient parking to cater for their anticipated use’ is likely to be interpreted as requiring parking spaces for HGVs that are waiting for their designated time slots to make deliveries and may mean that distribution parks will require a larger footprint to accommodate the same amount of commercial storage and office space.

For example, a new distribution park that needs to accommodate deliveries from 20 HGVs an hour would require 20 parking spaces (assuming a generous allowance for each HGV waiting for at least 30 minutes for its allocated slot). At an average of 120 m2 per space, the additional land required would be 0.24 hectares.