Work is set to begin shortly on a new Keswick town centre car park that will help secure youth service provision in the town.
Keswick Youth Centre Services has recently signed a partnership agreement with Ocean Parking to help it build and manage the car park on the site of the original youth club at The Old Mill off Main Street.
The charity has planning permission to run a 28-space site – nine of the spaces will be for permit holders and the remaining 19 for non-permit visitors. The site will be open from 7am to 7pm every day and will be camera-monitored with tariffs ranging from £2 to £10, encouraging longer term stays.
“Additional car parking spaces in the centre of Keswick will no doubt contribute positively towards easing our existing local parking challenges,” said Jorrit Jorritsma, chair of KYCS. “It will also help secure youth service provision in Keswick.”
He added that in Ocean Parking, KYCS had found a partner that strongly recognised the importance of community support by adopting a favourable fee structure, in turn maximising financial support for the work we do for the young people of Keswick and surrounding areas.
A report to the latest meeting of Keswick Town Council said that planning permission was granted for an interim car parking facility on the land to generate much-needed income for the club.
The report prepared by Cllr Lorraine Taylor said that a reputable company had been selected to run the car park on behalf of KYCS which includes groundwork and the erection of parking meters. It added that work was due to begin soon and the car park would be ready for March 2025.
Her report adds that it costs £30,000 a year to run the youth club and nearly 50 per cent of that amount goes towards renting the Rawnsley Centre where sessions for the town’s young people are held.
Funding comes from a variety of sources and these include donations from local community groups and grant applications made by trustees to larger funding bodies.
The report says this is a constant pressure for the youth club which needs to keep looking for future funding when current streams come to an end.
An ambition of KYCS is to construct a new purpose-built centre, with additional housing, on the site of the old centre that was demolished following the 2009 floods.
“One hundred per cent of the parking revenue our charity will receive will go towards realising our goal of creating a sustainably funded future of youth provision in Keswick,” said Jorrit.
“This long-term ambition includes ultimately building a purpose-built youth centre on the same site, funds permitting.”
KYCS had a battle to get planning permission for the car park with local residents claiming it would create congestion, noise, fumes and safety issues with concerns expressed about traffic entering and exiting the site from Main Street.
Cllr Taylor concluded her report by saying: “With so many youth clubs closing in the UK, Keswick is fortunate that there is a group of people in the town committed to providing a safe place for our young people to meet up and their hard work is to be commended.”
