'DIRE' car park overcrowding at Headington's hospitals is being exacerbated by staff taking patients' spaces, it has been claimed.

Responding to an 80-year-old woman, who said she has endured 'unacceptable' queues to visit her ill husband at the John Radcliffe, an Oxford city councillor said workers are making congestion worse.

In an email seen by the Oxford Mail, Alex Hollingsworth said: "I have been told by a senior manager at the [Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation] Trust that he knows that spaces allocated to patients and visitors are being heavily used by staff.

"I have also been told that the patient car parks are being used for all-day parking by people working in both Headington and the city centre.

"These are things that can and should be prevented by the trust - the failure to do so is a major cause of the shortage of spaces for patients and visitors."

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He said he understands rule changes are afoot to deter staff and commuters from using the car park, adding: "They cannot be introduced quickly enough."

The councillor was responding to a complaint from Rosanne Bostock, 80, who says gridlock at the John Radcliffe and Churchill hospitals has become 'dire and unacceptable'.

On Friday she said the queue was so bad that she had to gain permission to park at her old school instead, and walk 5,000 steps to the hospital and back.

However, the North Oxford resident said she was 'doubtful' that staff and commuters were choosing to park there.

Mrs Bostock, who runs the OxClean litter-pick scheme, said: "There is a perfectly good park and ride in Headington, it's highly unlikely that anybody wants to park at the JR more than they have to.

"Everybody is blaming everybody else, passing the buck around. It's completely ridiculous."

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New NHS data shows that in 2018/19, Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust took £586,500 in income from staff car parking, and almost £2.8m from visitor and patient parking.

Mrs Bostock is among thousands of people calling for a multi-storey car park at the John Radcliffe, to solve the 'enormous stress' of congestion.

Marston city councillor Mick Haines started a petition earlier this year, calling for an increase in spaces there via a multi-storey car park.

Oxford Mail:

Almost 4,000 people have signed so far, but there is doubt that the idea will come to fruition.

In June, the hospital trust confirmed it hoped to file a planning application for a multi-storey car park at the John Radcliffe by the end of 2019.

However, while the move would free up space on site, it would not create more spaces.

This is due to Oxford City Council guidelines, which state there should be no overall increase in private car parking spaces in busy areas like Headington.

In his email to Mrs Bostock, Mr Hollingsworth explained: "Both the city and county councils have a long-standing policy of not increasing the total amount of car parking on the hospital sites in Headington. This is because the level of traffic is already too high, with serious impacts on local people.

"However the allocation of spaces between patients, visitors and staff on the hospital sites, and the management of that allocation, is not something the councils can control."

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The councillor said congestion had also been inflamed by the public campaign to block service changes at the Horton General Hospital in Banbury.

He said a plan to transfer tens of thousands of out-patient appointments to Banbury, to ease pressure on Oxford, had been delayed due to the campaigners' legal challenge.

Mr Hollingsworth stressed that the councils are working 'constructively' with the trust, however, and all parties were 'committed to getting there.'

In the email, he revealed: "Senior managers at the trust have recently been in touch with [the] city council wanting to discuss a ‘masterplan’, which would include their ideas for sorting out the parking and transport issues.

"There are solutions readily available to the trust, and I hope they will take them up as a matter of urgency."

He suggested a time limit on the visitor car park to reduce use by staff and other workers, and improving signage to point queuing visitors to free spaces.

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Jason Dorsett, chief finance officer at the trust, said: "We apologise to patients and visitors who are experiencing problems when they need to use our parking facilities, and fully understand their frustration.

"We are working closely with Oxford City Council and Oxfordshire County Council to make our car parks more efficient, and improve traffic flow to the hospital sites in the near future, so they can be also more accessible by public transport.

"Together we are also looking into long-term plans to increase our parking provision for patients."