We write in response to your story “Residents bemoan lack of available parking spaces, Chronicle, August 4, and can only feel complete sympathy with those affected, as residents of Beacon Road, Kingswear, are and have been for some years, also suffering from the aggravation created by Dartmouth employees and other opportunists random parking, sometimes for days on end. As fellow victims, we concur.

When we first moved into Beacon Road over 20 years ago, there was a parking scheme in force whereby each house was issued with up to two visitors- parking permits – these at least served to make unauthorised parking identifiable, even if they did not entirely eliminate the problem.

This scheme, however, and for reasons which remain unclear, was withdrawn over 10 years ago. Since then, over several years, we have personally written and telephoned on numerous occasions to both South Hams District Council and to Devon County Council’s highways department to request the reintroduction of a parking scheme or, at the very least, some signage for Beacon Road similar to that already existing on Church Hill, but so far, apart from polite acknowledgements and/or rejections on the grounds of cost, we have drawn a blank.

Additionally, while we cannot speak for residents elsewhere in Kingswear and with reference specifically to Beacon Road, it would also be helpful if there could be some form of enforcement for residents to use their garages for their intended purpose and not occupy the road with up to four vehicles per household while the garages are occupied by boating and other miscellaneous equipment.

Quite apart from our own immediate vicinity, the increase in vehicle “clutter” on our local roads over recent years – and especially since the introduction of a charging system at Dart Haven Marina’s car park – is desperately apparent, and driving from our house out of the village now feels more like exiting a large, if somewhat diffuse, car park.

Quite apart from the inconvenience caused to residents, this cannot leave a good impression on our visitors, who doubtless come here for our delightful riverside location, not to visit an extended parking lot.

Additionally, and on a more serious note, we wonder how any of the emergency services would be able to reach our immediate neighbourhood or ourselves, should the need arise.

While writing, and in the interests of fairness, we would take issue with Ms O’Rourke’s assertion that ... “we’re not listened to and I think it’s because we’re ex-council tenants. If we lived in mansions, they’d do something about it”.

In such a small village this issue affects the whole population and that kind of misguided bigotry can only serve to alienate the authorities to whom the problem is addressed and who, presumably, previously provided the council accommodation occupied by the lady.

Finally, we applaud the efforts of the Kingswear Parish Council and live in hope that it succeeds – where we to date have failed – in obtaining a positive response from DCC and/ or SHDC.

Mr and Mrs G Harrison

Beacon Road, Kingswear