THERE seems to be a culture of fear descending over all too many of our car parks these days – at least if members of Princes Risborough Town Council are to be believed.

Trust seems to be the issue, with councillors fearing one-time car park users are quite literally steering clear of the town’s car park for fear of being levied fines they either don’t deserve or don’t understand.

This time it is concern over the new Automatic Numberplate Recognition system that has recently come into effect at so many car parks across the Wycombe District. It is, I suppose, the effect of introducing such technology into what has traditionally been a pretty low tech procedure. As ever, the more technical things get, the more things there are that can go wrong with them – and the more we worry that they will.

I can’t help but think the parking fiasco that started just over a year ago at the Wycombe Rye Lido might have kick-started this understandable paranoia. Back in August 2013, you may recall, hundreds of car park users were wrongly fined for not paying their charges when signs clearly told them these charges had not even come into effect yet.

After much wrangling, appealing and complaining, most of those fined had their charges cancelled. But ever since we have had a steady stream of people complaining that they have been penalised by the parking management company at that car park, even as they swear blind they have done everything right – entered the correct licence number and paid the right money.

I actually like ANPR, and so far have had no problems when I have parked at any of the WDC car parks using that system (which are quite distinct from the Lido car park, it is worth noting), although a few more pay points wouldn’t go amiss to cut down on those annoying queues.

Pay and display was always an annoying system thanks to those last minute dashes back to the car ahead of the parking attendant’s vigilant patrol. Although it is a shame ANPR means people can no longer enact one of the simplest, yet most gratifying (and penny-pinching) acts of kindness possible to a complete stranger– that of offering a newcomer to the car park the ticket you had more time on than you actually needed.

But it doesn’t take much to send car parkers scurrying for cover once they have been on the wrong side of a fine – particularly an incorrect one. I bet residential roads around the Rye are a fair bit busier than they used to be since Lidogate exploded, as a fair few dog walkers and park-users avoid the car park at all costs. The sooner it gets a new parking system set up, the better.

And apparently a similar fear is now keeping Risborough’s parkers out of that town’s designated slots – although we have certainly had no rush of complaints about unfair charges Statistics given by Wycombe District Council suggest most people have got to grips with the system and also that relatively few are having problems with it – once they get past the initial shock of having to do things differently.

Change, after all, is never the most popular thing for people to have to deal with, so hopefully for Risborough and its town centre this mistrust of ANPR will be a short lived one.