Are our councils losing their enthusiasm for park-and-ride?

The system which Oxford pioneered in the 1970s and has been copied in towns and cities the world over, is slowly being dismantled.

The root of the problem is Oxfordshire County Council's decision to stop charging for hundreds of street parking spaces in the evenings and on Sundays.

With the prospect of park-and-ride becoming less attractive, Oxford Bus Company has withdrawn some of the dedicated park-and-ride services, forcing passengers on to local buses.

Now Oxford City Council is considering sweeping cuts in security on the park-and-ride sites to save more than £300,000.

If the cuts go through, there will be no security guards after 7pm at at least two of the three sites it runs.

Park-and-ride has been hugely successful in keeping traffic out of the city.

But to encourage its use, motorists must be satisfied that their vehicles are reasonably safe.

The council may argue that most commuters have collected their cars and driven home by 7pm, but a considerable number are still parked there most evenings.

We can only hope the prediction of one security guard that the car parks will become a "sweet shop for thieves" proves to be wildly inaccurate.