Lancashire's new council-employed traffic wardens hit the streets for the first time yesterday. But how will the scheme be operated and do residents think the 90 parking enforcers will solve the county's problems? DAVID HIGGERSON and IAN SINGLETON report. . .

COUNTY Hall bosses performed a U-turn when they opted not to issue penalty notices on the first day of decriminalised parking.

Senior officials behind the new ParkWise scheme pulled back in favour of a more 'softly, softly' approach, giving drivers a week's grace before fines kick in.

No reason was given for the change of heart, but a spokesman for Lancashire County Council, which estimates 150,000 tickets will be issued every year, said: "It's about educating people not to break the law."

Originally, the fortnight before the official hand-over of parking enforcement from the police to the council had been earmarked for blitzing illegally-parked cars with leaflets warning of the tickets which could follow.

Under the scheme, penalty notices paid within two weeks will cost £30, within 28 days £60 and beyond that £90.

But yesterday, instead of the anticipated blitz -- equivalent to 412 tickets a day across the county -- only a handful of tickets were issued.

The spokesman added: "They were only to cars parked in dangerous and ridiculous places."

Lancashire County Council runs the system with 12 borough councils. Individually, they decide how many staff they will need each week and which areas to blitz. Staff are contracted in from NCP, the car parking firm behind the infamous Westminster parking scandal, which involved incentives for wardens to issue more tickets.

The only exception is in Ribble Valley, which has opted to employ its own staff so they can fulfil more of an 'ambassadorial' role for the council on the streets of the rural borough.

As a result, a fortnight's grace from fines was always planned in Ribble Valley, and in Blackburn with Darwen, which takes control of its own system in October.

But drivers elsewhere in Lancashire -- Hyndburn, Burnley, Pendle, Rossendale, Chorley and South Ribble -- will have just a week.

ParkWise is an issue which has polarised opinion.

Even the fact the council spent £16,000 bringing in 'reputation management consultants' to launch the scheme rather than using its own corporate communication department caused outrage.

County councillor Jean Yates, Lancashire's cabinet member for highways and transportation, said: "ParkWise is all about improving road safety, cutting congestion and managing the highways more efficiently."

Wardens who took their duties to extremes

TRAFFIC wardens were never popular.

But residents in cities where parking has been de-criminalised have found the new council-run breed to be even worse.

Perhaps the biggest outrage so far has been in Westminster, where the council also appointed NCP.

It offered the prize of a £12,000 car for the employee who issued the most tickets over a six-month period.

The scheme was later scrapped after widespread condemnation from motoring groups and residents.

After complaints from increasingly irate residents, bosses at Westminster City Council this summer ordered the traffic wardens to use more common sense.

In Manchester a bus was given a parking ticket at a bus stop and a rabbit hutch was ticketed outside a pet shop. After two years, Manchester City Council became so fed up of the complaints that it scrapped the policy.

In Portsmouth, the council brought in £1.8million in the first year from illegal parkers, doubling the amount of revenue police collected.

The vast amount of tickets were issued in residential areas for parking on double yellow lines or in restricted areas such as taxi ranks, bus lay-bys or disabled bay.

But Kevin Delaney, traffic manager for the RAC Foundation, said setting such a high target was not a good start.

He added: "Lancashire is making exactly the same mistake as other local authorities. Rather than looking at how much illegal parking there is and setting a target for the level of compliance, they are identifying how many tickets to issue to make money."

Parking 'nightmare' in town centre

CLITHEROE'S town centre streets have been a parking nightmare.

Many householders feared traffic chaos when council-appointed wardens took to the streets for the first time yesterday.

By late afternoon many residents reported no change in motorists' habits, with cars still parking in designated "limited waiting" areas. And residents in Church Brown Gardens, which has no parking restrictions, said motorists were now using their road as an unofficial car park.

The new enforced parking rules in York Street, Well Terrace, Church Brow, Church Street, Brennand Street, Railway View Road and St Mary's Street have seen residents calling for residents only parking.

Peter and Marion Miller, a retired couple who live in Church Brow Gardens, said the restrictions will force more vehicles into their non-restricted road. Peter, 65, said: "It was bad enough when people felt they could park as long as they wanted on Church Brow, but now they will be displaced onto our road. We are the nearest available road with no restrictions."

Burnley-based window cleaner John Knight, who works in Clitheroe once a fortnight, said the restrictions could be a headache.

He said: "It means I might have to park further away and would have to carry my ladder backwards and forwards.

" I've been coming here for 40 years and this is the worst parking I've known."

Daniel Herbert, the council's principal engineer, said that motorists were being given a two week period of grace during which they'll only receive a warning notice.

He added: "We've had some teething problems with the hand-held computers carried by our parking attendants, so consequently we've only issued one warning so far."