A TOURIST says he will never visit York again after his family and two friends were fined up to £210 - because they had returned to their parked cars 18 minutes late.

Chartered architect Brian Martin, from Bedford, has written to City of York Council to say the families' weekend stay in the city had been soured by their experiences at a privately-owned car park.

"Because we were intending to visit the railway museum later in the day, we parked at the Leeman Road car park, owned by Euro Car Parks," he said. "We bought tickets for a three-hour stay and went about our business. We lost our way and were delayed in returning to the car park, and had exceeded our parking time by 18 minutes.

"We were not parking illegally as we had purchased a ticket. We had merely lost our way and misjudged the time."

He said all three cars had been ticketed, with a £70 fine for each vehicle, reduced to £50 if settled within 14 days.

He said that while he appreciated some measure was necessary to ensure parking times were kept, he believed such a high fine was punitive.

"While I appreciate the quality and interest of what you have to offer, our visit was soured and I will never visit the city again."

He questioned why the authority was allowing such fines to be imposed, and asked what the city's attitude would be if the fines were raised to hundreds of pounds.

But a council spokeswoman said charges and penalties in privately owned car parks were not within the council's remit, and the authority had no control over them.

A Euro Car Parks spokesman said the fines were broadly in line with those imposed by local authorities and were used across the country, and that motorists were warned of them when they parked up.

He claimed the penalties were not draconian, but were meant to be punitive to encourage people to pay the charges and return to their cars in time.

He said that a five-minute leeway was given to people returning slightly late to their vehicles, but suggested that tourists should give themselves a little extra time when visiting a strange city, to ensure they got back to their vehicles in time.

Updated: 10:59 Monday, September 06, 2004