Parking charges to hit £6 an hour in Glasgow if new plans get go ahead

dailyrecord.co.uk:

Stringent budget cuts could see parking in Glasgow increase to nearly £6 per hour in a bid to save £68million.SNP-run Glasgow City Council is also considering bin collections just once a month and charging for entry into the glasshouses at the Botanics while CCTV could be cut by 12 hours so it only runs from 4pm until 4am.Tollcross Children's Farm, which is home to a family of alpacas and is free to enter in one of the city's poorest regions, could close along with the sale of the Clydesdale horses based at Pollok Park.School crossing patrols could also be axed at spots near traffic signals, and popular events funded by the council including Winterfest and Drumchapel Bonfire could be scrapped.Councillors will meet next week to make their decision in setting the budget for 2023/24 in, what leader Susan Aitken has described, as the "most challenging circumstances for public finances in decades".Some suggestions bring Glasgow in line with other councils including increasing funeral charges and parking, which could mirror Edinburgh prices, which range from 90p to £5.60 per hour.Suggestions put forward by the Neighbourhood, Regeneration and Sustainability (NRS) departments included closing the Queens Glasshouse and rehome the animal, removing kerbside glass collections and blue bins from public sites.Kerbside collections could be brought in, while housing associations could be charged for using recycling centres,Allotment costs could be updated along with charges for street cafes, while 141 jobs could be lost.Chris Mitchell, GMB convenor, said while the bins proposal would bring savings, it will only increase problems faced by cleansing staff.He said: "The idea behind it is that there will be more recycling so the bins don't