Why Britain’s Biggest Parking Operator Has Just Shut 29 City Centre Car Parks

Britain’s largest paid parking operator has shut 29 of its busiest sites in city centres from London to Belfast, leaving thousands of regular users to scramble for alternatives and exposing the wider collapse of the high street car park as a business model. National Car Parks, better known as NCP, entered administration in March under the weight of falling commuter footfall and rising costs, and PricewaterhouseCoopers has been winding down its loss making sites ever since. The latest round of closures, confirmed at the end of April, brings the total number of shuttered NCP locations to 29 with more expected, and the company’s parent has not ruled out further withdrawals.

NCP operated 340 sites and employed almost 700 people before going into administration, and many of those sites sit on the prime city centre land that determines how easy it is to drive into a town for work, hospital appointments, theatre trips or shopping. When a major NCP closes, the result is often higher prices at the remaining car parks, longer searches for a space, and in some cases the disappearance of any covered parking option altogether. The chain reaction is already reshaping how local councils think about urban parking, and how drivers think about whether driving in at all is worth the hassle.

What has actually closed and where

The first wave of closures was announced on 27 March, with NCP confirming 20 sites would shut immediately because they were, in the administrator’s words, “commercially unviable”. The list included some of the busiest urban locations in the country. London Knightsbridge and London King’s Cross St Pancras both closed, as did Birmingham Gough Street, Bristol Nelson Street, Exeter Market Street, Eastbourne Trinity Place and Bournemouth Hinton Road. Smaller markets were hit too, with closures in Ashford, Ashton-under-Lyne, Banbury, Bexley, Bromley, Grantham, Hinckley, Ipswich and Luton. Leicester saw four of its five NCP sites shut in a single day.

A second wave of four closures followed on 16 April, taking out Belfast Dublin Road, Coventry Belgrade Plaza, Leicester St Nicholas Circle and Sheffield Blonk Street. A third wave on 30 April closed five more: Bradford Southgate, Chester Browns Yard, Kidderminster Swan Centre, Nottingham Huntingdon Street and Southampton Portland Terrace. PricewaterhouseCoopers, the administrators handling the wind down, has told staff that further closures are possible if buyers cannot be found for the remaining loss making sites.

Not every closed site is gone for good. In Leicester, the city mayor Sir Peter Soulsby confirmed that Euro Car Parks has taken over the operation of three of the five former NCP sites. He said: “Although Leicester benefits from a good range of parking spaces, the re-opening of these car parks gives people more choice, and reassurance when visiting the city centre, so this news is very welcome.” Other operators including Q-Park, APCOA and councils themselves are reported to be in talks for several of the higher value sites in central London. But for towns with smaller catchments and lower turnover, the replacement is more likely to be private development than another car park.

Why one of Britain’s biggest parking operators fell over

NCP is owned by Japanese company Park24, and its UK operation has been struggling since the pandemic for reasons that affect every operator in the sector. Commuter footfall has not recovered to pre 2020 levels in most British city centres. Hybrid working has structurally reduced midweek demand. The shift to online shopping has cut into weekend retail trips. Cycle to work schemes and improved public transport have eroded the captive market further. And NCP has had to pay higher operating costs across the board, with energy bills, insurance, lighting maintenance and security all rising significantly faster than the rate NCP could push its parking prices up without losing more customers.

PwC said in its administration statement that the company had “insufficient cash available to meet its financial obligations”. The administrator confirmed that the priority was to find buyers for individual sites that could trade profitably on their own, while shutting those that could not. Several factors explain why some sites are commercially viable and others are not. A site near a hospital with no nearby alternative will fill its bays every weekday whatever the price. A site three streets from a Park and Ride or a council operated multi storey will not.

What this means for drivers in the affected cities

The immediate effect on drivers is the loss of bay capacity in city centres that were already short of spaces. In Birmingham, Gough Street alone offered hundreds of spaces close to the Mailbox, and its closure has pushed pressure onto council multi storeys and onto the on street parking around Broad Street. In Bristol, Nelson Street was one of the closest covered car parks to The Galleries. In London, the Knightsbridge closure removes one of the few covered options near Harrods, Hyde Park and the South Kensington museums.

Prices at remaining sites have already moved upwards in some markets, particularly London, where central multi storeys reported by the AA were charging £6 to £8 an hour in early May, against £4 to £6 a year ago. Drivers who relied on monthly season tickets at the closed NCP sites have been offered refunds for the unused portion of their contracts, and most have been able to transfer to alternative operators, but rates at the new providers are often higher than the old NCP price.

The other effect is more subtle. Drivers who park on the street in towns where the NCP has closed will find that local councils, sensing the opportunity, are raising on street parking charges to capture the displaced demand. Several councils have signalled they will increase central zone pay and display rates in their summer budget rounds, citing the loss of supply from the private sector.

What to do if you were a regular NCP user

First, check the official NCP website or the administrator’s notice before you set off. PwC has published the list of closed sites on the NCP corporate page, and the company’s app should reflect closures, but several drivers have reported that the app was still showing closed sites as available in the first few days after closure. If you have a monthly or annual NCP season ticket, contact PwC’s NCP creditors helpline rather than the local site, because the local staff have in many cases already left.

Second, plan a backup. The websites Parkopedia, JustPark and YourParkingSpace cover most private car parks in the UK and let you compare prices and book in advance, often at a discount to the drive up rate. In London the Transport for London app shows council operated spaces. In other cities, the local council website is usually the best source for its own multi storeys, which are generally cheaper than the private operators.

Third, consider whether the trip still makes sense by car. Park and Ride sites operated by local councils have grown in capacity in many cities, with daily charges typically £3 to £5 including the bus into the centre. Train fares may also work out cheaper than the new central parking rates, especially with rail card discounts. The collapse of central parking supply is in many cases pushing the maths in favour of leaving the car at home for inner city trips, which is exactly the trend that has been hollowing out NCP’s revenue.

What comes next for the rest of the sector

NCP is not the only operator under pressure. APCOA, Q-Park, Saba and Indigo are all reporting that the post pandemic shift in commuter behaviour has been deeper than expected, and most are quietly closing or selling underperforming sites. The British Parking Association has been lobbying for VAT relief on car park operating costs and for council support in keeping city centre supply viable, but with most councils’ own multi storeys running at a loss, the appetite for further support is limited.

The longer term picture is one of fewer, more expensive central car parks, more reliance on Park and Ride, and a slow but steady contraction in the convenience of driving into a city. Drivers who depend on city centre parking should expect prices to keep rising, capacity to keep falling and disruption to continue. For some, the only practical answer will be to combine the car with public transport, or to do the trip differently altogether. For NCP, the longer term picture is more uncertain. PwC’s brief is to keep selling viable sites and shutting the rest, and the company that once defined paid parking in Britain may not exist in its current form by the end of the year.

Sources:

• Parking giant NCP confirms nationwide closure of 29 popular car parks – full list – GB News
• PwC administrations – PricewaterhouseCoopers
• British Parking Association