THE complex issue of car parking in Ilkley has been placed in the hands of a parish council project manager.

Former Ilkley Parish Council chairman, Councillor Brian Mann, this week was the latest member of the council to become an overall project manager for a major local issue.

Councillor Mann will work with other organisations to look into possible solutions to various parking problems around the town, and plans to start by forming a team of councillors and experts from outside the council to study parking solutions.

He was part of a working group set up to look into car parking issues before the Ilkley Parish split and a reorganisation of the committees system last year.

The group was set up to study issues including street parking in depth, following Bradford Council's decision to abandon parking solutions suggested by an external consultant in the much-criticised Faber Maunsell report on traffic and parking.

Coun Mann says the group achieved a number of successes working with Bradford Council, including freeing up parking spaces at the Railway Road car park and on South Hawksworth Street, and bringing about higher all-day parking charges at the central South Hawksworth Street car park to dis-courage commuters to Leeds and Bradford taking up town centre parking all day.

The work of the working groups came under the parish council's General Purposes Committee last year, in a re-organisation of the way the way the local council works.

But because the committee - and the council as a whole - now oversees so many issues, councillors have been encouraged to become project managers to take a lead on specific projects or issues.

Coun Mann is confident that parking can be improved in the town, but has warned residents not to expect miracles.

He said: "I don't have a magic wand however, and it will be an uphill slog. The thing is, there are things we can do and things we can look at, such as working with Bradford Council to optimise what we've got.

"We've got to try to do something."

Members of his parking team are likely to include representatives of Bradford Council, and other organisations such as Ilkley Civic Society, may be invited to join. The Civic Society drew up a parking plan for Ilkley which is has been given to the parish council.