Motorhome Friendly and Unfriendly Parking in Bristol.

On 14th September 2006, Bristol City Council provided the following information:
The council provided a list of parking areas controlled by Bristol City Council showing information pertaining to the access restrictions that apply. The list can be download in Adobe Acrobat (pdf) format from here.
Please note that all car parks do not permit overnight camping and have restrictions in place limiting their use to vehicles with a maximum weight of 1525kg (PLG).
All car parks are either Pay and Display (P&D), with the relevant costs being displayed at the car park, or are free, limited to 3 hours maximum stay, Monday to Friday.
Vehicles must park within marked bays, where present, and not occupy additional bays. All car parks, unless stated, are marked out with parking bays approximately 2.5m by 6m. No car parks have specific provision for motorhomes.
No toilet provision is available at any of the car parks listed.
Bristol City Council have further parking details on their web site.

Update 14 June 2007:
Some time after the initial reply from Bristol City Council above it came to my notice that many other vehicles (e.g. large 4x4s) weigh in excess of 1.5 tonnes (some of the largest 4x4s even being heavier than many motorhomes). A further request for information was sent to the council asking for clarification. In response the council stated "I have looked again at what I stated to you and the parking orders that cover the parking areas. Firstly I must apologies for giving you misleading information. The parking orders now refer to a motor vehicle as being one as described in the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984 Section 136. This indicated that the limit as being 3050 kg (3 tons), which should cover the vehicles that you have mentioned. The figure I used, 1525kg, is a figure that had been used in the past as being the guide weight. This relates to a vehicle being 1.5 tons and at that time was the limit used in the orders. It would seem, on checking my records, that the meaning of a motor vehicle was amended within the order to refer to the description as prescribed by the above act and I had not picked this fact up. Again my apologies for this and I can assure you that vehicles under this weight will be ok within our car parks, as long as they meet the other requirement when using a car park, ie any height restrictions."
The Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984 is accessible on-line on the UK Statute Law Database HERE

On 13th March 2009, a request was sent to the Council asking if it was possible to park a motorhome at the P&R sites it provides. On 16th March 2009, the council replied:
We have 3 permanent Park & Ride sites in Bristol, on the A4 Bath Road at Brislington, the A370 at Long Ashton and the A4 Portway at Shirehampton. I can confirm that there are no height restrictions at any of these sites and motorhomes are more than welcome. I also confirm that there is no overnight parking at any of these sites and that sleeping and eating is not allowed.
Further P&R details can be found on the council web site Here.
Users of this web site have provided the following information:
1) May 2008. We used the Asda store in Bedminster for shopping when leaving to move on. Also passed the Aldi store in North Road - didn't try parking but it looked big enough. Both these stores are close to the CC Baltic Wharf site. Aldi in easy walking distance using footbridge over the river.
2) Please add Asda Walmart Cribbs Causeway, North West Bristol - adjacent to Junction 17 M5 - to your list of parking. Easy access to a very large car park, and a popular break stop for caravans and motor campers of all sizes. Fuel available, and the station canopy has been raised to accommodate HGV’s. A McDonalds is very close by, as is Cribbs Causeway Regional Shopping Centre. Can get busy of a Saturday morning and early afternoon, school holidays. (Many thanks to CI for this information, received 6 Septenber 2010).

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Last updated: 6 September 2010