No News Yet on the New Booking System

TTDA, to try and answer your question...the example in my photo is a bone ride 'aire' listed in the various reference media, apps etc and, as the sign shows, it's for MH only. 

that example wouldn't seem (to me) to be big enough for the boy racer type you mention...we've stay on many, many such 'sites' and only once, in France on a shared area with local village hall, did we get noise at night...but they soon got fed up and went away...

along with 8-10 thousand formal 'aires' in France alone, there are hundreds of thousands of less formal 'car parks', often used by MH but shared with other local traffic....these might attract more comings and goings, in fact one of our overnights in Irun, while listed in the Aires books, is a shared car park, close to a local small supermarket, but 'at the vanners' end' it's generally quiet...it also attracts a small fee of €2 or so and tickets are checked by the local police, which in fact gives a good feeling.

probably not attractive to a typical caravaner looking for a warden and a peg, but used by hundreds of vans every year as a rest spot after the winter trudge down through France and before the hike over the Pyrenees to the sunshine.

I usually have the next rest spot in mind, based on my driving expectations, but this doesn't always pan out and a quick check on one of the apps (park4night etc) can often throw up a real, previously undiscovered, gem.

of course, 'gem' in this case means a decent parking area, close to the town, well lit and easy to access etc...many won't see the term 'gem' being used in the same sentence as car park...but we are looking for something with a specific purpose.

Steve (and others) have started using Camping Car Parks...a private organisation who took over the running of a number of village aires from the local authorities and added better booking, more security etc....but at a price, around €9-€15. We have yet to try them, mainly as there are still so many other types to choose from we wouldn't want a restricted number of CCP locations to drive our itinerary...for us, it must be the other way round.

try looking at CAMPING-CAR-infos website....view 'cherche un aire NEW 2020' where they've added a far better search...this will give you an idea of the choice out there.

back to CC...the sites are already known, already have a booking system, are considering new pitch type booking, have a payments system, some sites have the space (possibly under utilised), have a rising number of Campervan/MH members (with facility also available to caravans) all of whom are looking for better value based on certain specific needs.

yes, we know what the club currently offers and, yes, we can all go elsewhere for something different....but times are changing and any relatively easily increased revenue stream at minimum cost should be worth investigating, especially if it gives great value to those pesky customers.

new pitch type ('aire pitch') to be sold via normal booking system to add useful extra capacity to sites and to provide extra dimension for touring vans (caravans and MH)

BB, Here is what the Club said about this at the 2020 AGM

"At the beginning of this year (2020) we commenced an exploration as to whether this is something we could viably offer. Unfortunately, due to the pandemic, this project is currently temporarily suspended, however it is planned to re-initiate in 2021".

2021 is nearly at an end and to my knowledge nothing has yet happened.  Meantime others are cracking on raising the need for such facilities and over a hundred official Aires have been established in the last year along with ongoing trials in other areas.

peedee

2021 is nearly at an end and to my knowledge nothing has yet happened. Meantime others are cracking on raising the need for such facilities and over a hundred official Aires have been established in the last year along with ongoing trials in other areas.

If this is the case then why not simply use these new aires PD, why are you so keen that the club should also have them? 

and some rules that allow normal visitors to use them from, say 10am - 5pm (or thereabouts) and one nighter stopover vans to use them out of those hours.

so what would 'normal' visitors use these for? parking? sitting out?

in order to maintain spacing, every other wide pitch could be coned off, giving 6m. No awnings, table, chairs etc....cars to be left hooked to caravans for spacing purposes...in the day time, visitors to use all spaces

Firstly I think you have got the spacing idea wrong, it is 6m between adjacent walls of an outfit, you can have a car or awning with that 6m, but they have to be 3m from each other.

So every other wide pitch coned off and I suppose not used? Isn't that lost potential income?

in the day time, visitors to use all spaces

again what or who are these visitors? 

Thanks BB. We only stop somewhere if it feels safe. Sadly not too prevalent other than a site of some kind in this country. We joined Britstops this year, and have been using searchforsites website as well, as there’s usually feedback on what folks have found. Hard to tour in this country now via Club Sites, very few open now in Winter, and spread widely, so we rely more on CLs and small private Sites this time of year.

I’d like to see what they suggest. As BB mentions, we have used the Camping car park chain in France, plus a couple of others, when they weren’t available. We very much like what CCP provide, are happy to pay for it and use them as a default. We might like what the CAMC come up with.

No cordon between alternate pitches. This is Gloucester M5 services. But the Cluib is reluctant to copy it.

With regard to the 'visitors' questions....I'm advocating using 'visitors parking areas' to double up as additional overnight parking during the 'evening' (with appropriate spacing' but to remain as visitor parking during the daytime, where less spacing would be required.

hence, no additional pitches/space needs to be commandeered, other than appropriate markings for a dual purpose area.

ET's photo shows vehicles too close for the club (although not unusual for typical continental aire..) but wider spaces (with alternates being used could do the job) and when reverting to 'the visitor car park' then the number of vehicles would increase.

of course, some sites may have much more spare space that could be organised to provide this sort of overnighting without impacting other parking provision at all.

yes but I feel it will be a good while yet, they were only planning to explore the viability and I think that won't start till next year at least now?

Are they actually staying overnight there, or is it just a parking area?

The club is also bound by the fire spacing rule/regulations.