Angel Hill, Chequer Square, Cornhill and every other car park and street bay priced. Short stay is free from 3pm Tuesdays. No park and ride.
Two rules do most of the work in Bury St Edmunds, and both have a catch.
Short stay car parks and on-street bays are free from 3pm every Tuesday. The council states this on each car park page. The catch is in the same sentence: the offer does not apply in any long stay car park. So Ram Meadow, Parkway multi-storey and St Andrews long stay all charge as normal on a Tuesday afternoon, while School Yard and Parkway surface next door do not.
A Blue Badge does not park free in a council car park here. It is free in most on-street bays and at Chequer Square. Everywhere else it pays, sometimes at a discount, sometimes at the same rate as everybody else. The detail is further down.
One current closure: half of the School Yard car park is shut from 13 July until 6 September 2026, according to the council’s page for the site.
All-day parking
If you are staying more than three hours, only three car parks are worth considering.
| Car park | All day | Weekly | Spaces |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ram Meadow, Cotton Lane IP33 1XP | £3.50 | £10.50 | 823 |
| Parkway multi-storey, IP33 3BA | £4.00 | £12.00 | 592 |
| St Andrews long stay, IP33 1TZ | £4.00 | £12.00 | 242 |
Ram Meadow is the cheapest and much the largest. Three hours there costs £3.00, so the extra 50p for the full day is the obvious move. It also has a section for up to five motorhomes, open 24 hours with no height restriction. Entry closes at 10pm but you can drive out at any time.
The Parkway multi-storey is locked between 1am and 6.30am daily, and closed on Christmas Day. An eight-week season ticket there costs £96, which is the only season ticket the council sells for Bury St Edmunds.
Short stay: the town centre car parks
Charges apply Monday to Saturday and, at most sites, on Sundays and bank holidays from 10am to 4pm.
| Car park | Tariff | Max stay | Spaces |
|---|---|---|---|
| Arc-Cattlemarket, IP33 3DG | £3.20 up to 2hr, £4.20 up to 3hr, £6.20 up to 4hr | 4hr | 865 |
| School Yard, IP33 3AA | £3.20 up to 2hr, £4.20 up to 3hr | 3hr | 61 |
| Parkway surface, IP33 3BA | £1.70 up to 1hr, £3.20 up to 3hr | 3hr | 252 |
| Lower Baxter Street, IP33 1ET | £1.70 up to 1hr, £2.70 up to 2hr | 2hr | 34 |
| Chequer Square, IP33 1QZ | £1.50 up to 30min, £2.70 up to 1hr, £4.00 up to 2hr | 2hr | 18 |
The Arc-Cattlemarket is the big one, 648 surface spaces and 217 underground. The underground level takes cash or RingGo only, no card, and it locks at 6pm. If there is a performance at the Apex it stays open until the audience has left. If you are locked in, the number to ring is 01284 763252.
Parkway surface is locked at 6.30pm. Chequer Square only charges from 9am, and just 1pm to 4pm on Sundays and bank holidays.
St Andrews flexi-stay is a different model: you check in on arrival and pay by card when you leave, on a sliding scale from £1.70 for an hour to £4.20 for six. Over six hours it jumps to £8.00, which makes it the most expensive way to spend a day in the town centre.
Where you can park free
- Vinery Road, Holywater Meadow, IP33 2JP. Free for two hours, no return within two hours, 40 spaces. No restrictions at all on Sundays and bank holidays.
- Olding Road, IP33 3TA. The West Suffolk House staff car park, 373 spaces, free and open to the public from 3.30pm to 11pm Monday to Friday, and 7am to 11pm at weekends and public holidays. It has six rapid EV charge points.
- Bury leisure centre, Beetons Way, IP33 3TT. Free at weekends. On weekdays it is £2.50 for up to three hours, cash only, but you can get three hours free by entering your registration on the touchscreen inside the centre.
- Short stay car parks and on-street bays, from 3pm every Tuesday.
- Motorcycle bays at Angel Hill and the Arc-Cattlemarket, though a motorcycle in a car space pays the car rate.
Two traps in the free parking. The front car park at West Suffolk House is free but limited to 90 minutes, and you must still display a valid ticket. Overstaying costs £70. And Lower Baxter Street has a second free window nobody advertises: 8am to 10am on Wednesdays, market day.
On-street parking
Most on-street bays in the centre charge £1.50 for 30 minutes, £2.70 for an hour and £4.00 for two, Monday to Saturday 9am to 6pm and Sunday and bank holidays 1pm to 4pm. That covers Abbeygate Street, Churchgate Street, Cotton Lane, Guildhall Street, Hatter Street, Looms Lane, Lower Baxter Street and Whiting Street.
The exceptions are worth knowing:
- Angel Hill starts at £2.00 for 30 minutes and charges from 8am. 93 spaces, two-hour maximum, no return within four hours.
- Cornhill-Buttermarket is £2.00 for 30 minutes and £2.70 for an hour, with a one-hour maximum. It is closed on market days, Wednesday and Saturday.
- Springfield Road is the cheapest at £1.00 for 30 minutes and £3.50 for two hours, RingGo only, Monday to Saturday 10am to 4pm. Five spaces.
Every one of these is free from 3pm on Tuesdays.
Blue Badge holders
This is where Bury St Edmunds is genuinely confusing, so here is what the council’s own pages say, site by site.
Free: Abbeygate Street, Churchgate Street, Cotton Lane, Guildhall Street, Hatter Street, Looms Lane, Lower Baxter Street, Whiting Street, Springfield Road and Chequer Square car park. Display the badge in the windscreen.
Free for up to three hours, but you must also set the time clock: Angel Hill and Cornhill-Buttermarket. No return within one hour.
Reduced but still charged: Arc-Cattlemarket (£3.20 for three hours, £4.20 for four), Parkway surface (£1.70 for three hours), School Yard (£3.20 for three hours), Lower Baxter Street car park (£1.70 for two hours), Ram Meadow and Parkway multi-storey (£3.00 all day), St Andrews flexi-stay (from £1.20).
Same price as everyone else: St Andrews long stay, and Bury leisure centre.
Accessible bays are thinnest where demand is highest: 43 at the Arc-Cattlemarket, 10 at Ram Meadow, six at the Parkway multi-storey, four at St Andrews flexi-stay, three at Parkway surface and two each at Chequer Square, Lower Baxter Street and St Andrews long stay.
Resident permits
There is only one residents’ parking zone in Bury St Edmunds: Zone A, the Brackland area. Haverhill has one as well.
Permits across the district cost between £30 and £80 a year depending on the zone, according to the council’s street parking page. The council does not publish the specific Zone A figure online, so this page cannot give it. Allow 10 working days for a permit to arrive.
Visitor vouchers are single-use and valid for one day. Scratch off two dates on one voucher and it is void. Carers and doctors get free permits, and contractor permits exist for tradespeople working at your property.
If you change your car, a permit covers the new vehicle for up to six weeks while you wait for the V5, but only if you email customer services first. A courtesy car is covered for 28 days on the same basis.
Suspending a bay costs £55 for the first day and £25 for each day after, per bay, and needs 15 working days’ notice.
Fines
Penalty charges are £70 for serious contraventions such as parking on yellow lines and £50 for lesser ones such as overstaying in a limited waiting bay. Both halve if you pay within 14 days.
Challenge it within 14 days and, if the challenge is rejected, the discount period restarts for another 14 days from the date of the rejection letter. That is a genuinely useful quirk: challenging costs you nothing in discount.
Miss the deadlines and a charge certificate raises it to £75 off-street or £105 on-street, then £83 or £113 once it is registered with the Traffic Enforcement Centre. Details on the council’s fines page.
The station
Bury St Edmunds station is managed by Greater Anglia and has 98 parking spaces and two accessible spaces, according to National Rail. Neither National Rail nor the operator publishes a tariff for it, so this page cannot tell you the price. Ram Meadow, about ten minutes’ walk south, charges £3.50 for the day.
There is no park and ride in Bury St Edmunds.
Country parks
An annual permit costs £30 for Nowton Park, £30 for West Stow Country Park, £30 for Brandon Country Park, or £45 for all three. A 2.1 metre height restriction barrier was due at Nowton Park in March 2026.
Also on this site: bin collection days, council tax bands and roadworks and travel.
Have your say