Inside the heart of the city centre, there are many unique, odd characters and activities that go on day and night. It’s really quite interesting to see how a historic city plays out its daily routine, just like you and I.

One oddity that continues to puzzle me is the ever-present mystery of parking on Lower Brook Street. Having now lived here a year, but only recently taking advantage of my Winchester City Council parking permit, I’ve observed a particularly unusual occurrence.

Bizarrely, I must live in the only ‘Residents Parking Zone’ that is only full between 8.45am and 5.30pm! Despite the high density of older residents who reside in what used to be our city’s slum area, there are an awfully larger number of people who are of working age, and who work a lot further than the usual walking commute would allow.

For this I see no reason why the number of cars should increase so dramatically during the day, with an entirely different set of cars at night.

Having gained a number of ‘detective’ qualities over the years, thanks to excessive consumption of excellent TV documentaries like The Bill and Diagnosis Murder, I have come to the conclusion that some of our dear local residents are giving out their parking permits to people who have absolutely no right to use them!

Having observed this over a number of days, the people parking the cars between 8.30am and 9am come in a variety of different shapes, sizes and shop uniforms! This doesn’t help residents like me, who very much need our fully paid for and legitimately required parking bays at what can be most bizarre times of the day.

Admittedly, I have a private space under my flat, which is used by my housemate, but during the day I allow a local charity to use it, saving them approximately £6 a day, £30 a week, and over £1,000 a year that can now go to people who really need it.

But our Council should be enforcing the parking permits for our restricted inner city bays just as well as they patrol our yellow lines and public car parks.

Although I can’t say I am the biggest fan our parking wardens, I believe this would be a real service to the local community, and make a positive difference to all of our particularly unique residents (myself included) who make up part of the unique character and activities that make this city such an interesting place to live.