A RESIDENTS-ONLY parking scheme could be introduced following complaints of town centre workers parking on streets.

Around 70 residents on Nelson’s Albert Street, Every Street and Mosley Street have voiced their concern to councillors.

They say every day workers park on the three residential streets for more than six hours and some householders have to park several hundred yards away.

One resident said the situation was now ‘ridiculous’.

Dad-of-three Sahir Khalid, 41, who has lived on Every Street for 10 years with his disabled mother, said: “We have done a petition five times in the last five years and still nothing has been sorted. People are just parking on these streets left, right and centre.

“Pedestrians are struggling to walk past and people in wheelchairs can’t get past because people just dump their cars anywhere.

“When we moved here we were promised car parking spaces and yet I sometimes have to park my car miles away.”

Single mother Noreen Hussain, 39, who has lived in the area since 2008, said: “I struggle to park on a daily basis and it get’s really bad during the week.

“I’ve even had parking tickets from having to park elsewhere, including a £50 fine once.”

Nelson’s area committee will meet today to discuss a proposal to bring in a residents-only scheme, which would need to be approved by the highway authority, Lancashire County Council, after questionnaires were sent to residents about the traffic study.

The meeting comes a year after a parking survey was conducted which showed that during the week the maximum number of vehicles parked on Albert Street at any one time equated to 93 per cent capacity, and of those vehicles 42 per cent were householders.

Cllr Nadeem Ahmed, who represents the area, said: “Hopefully the area committee and all the councillors will support the residents and move forward and try to get the scheme going. We will have to urge Lancashire County Council to implement the request because of the response we have had.”

The county council has told the committee they will only support residents-only parking where the district authority can clearly show a high level of available kerb space is occupied for more than six hours between 8am and 6pm on five or more days in a week.

A county council spokesman said: “We carry out regular enforcement of the restrictions on Moseley Street, Albert Street, and Every Street, and have issued seven penalty notices since June.”