A COUPLE warned today that their York restaurant and similar small businesses will go bankrupt unless evening parking charges are dropped soon.

Fernando and Jane Scanu, proprietors of Mamma Mia, in Gillygate, said they had suffered numerous cancelled bookings since the fees were introduced because customers refuse to pay the added costs.

Jane said: "As a normally flourishing business, which has been established in York for nearly 20 years, we have never experienced such a decrease in trade - and hence a drop in our takings - since March of this year, with the introduction of the new evening car parking charges.

"We have heard comments from once regular customers of 'We are not coming into York any more' on principle because of the evening car parking charges. They now eat outside the city."

The couple said they had lost a lot of early evening trade during the week. It was now too costly for pre theatre-goers who would previously have come out for a meal before going on to the theatre, particularly those with children.

They criticised City of York Council for introducing the charges, asking: "How would Coun Reid (executive member for planning and transport) and fellow members feel if it were their livelihoods that were in jeopardy or their salaries cut just overnight?

"If the evening car parking charges are not dropped and soon, York will become a ghost town and small businesses like ourselves will go bankrupt."

The restaurant couple claimed that the Bootham Row car park used to be full to overflowing on Friday and Saturday evenings, but now it was rarely half full.

"If it's before 7pm, people are hanging around the ticket machine until 7pm so they don't have to pay for another hour.

"How can extra revenue be generated from the new parking restrictions and charges when people will and are most definitely refusing to use them?"

They added that the reduced evening concession was not cost- effective, because part-time staff did not work a consistent week.

Coun Reid said: "By carrying out the parking review, we have recognised the concerns expressed by this business.

"However, figures show that increasing numbers of people are using the car parks in the evenings.

"If the suggestion of an 'evening out' package is adopted we would hope that restaurants such as this one would work with us to make it a success.

"One of the issues we are looking at is the actual payment methods to see if we can introduce a system that allows people to pay for the actual time that they park rather than in hourly chunks."

Updated: 10:45 Monday, August 23, 2004