Brighton Grub Hub volunteers caught at Valley Gardens bus gates

Drivers with Brighton and Hove Grub Hub were on their way to pick up food parcels when they were fined for driving into Gloucester Place from the wrong direction.

Mitchie Alexander, the organisation's volunteer co-ordinator, said she directed them to go down North Road before making a collection from One Church.

But two volunteers got confused and went along Marlborough Place into Gloucester Road instead, resulting in two fines.

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She shared the experience of the charity - which grows vegetables for food banks - amid increasing controversy about the high level of fines from the cameras.

Mitchie said: “Some of them didn’t see the signs and thought I’d made a mistake with the directions when they saw ‘local traffic’ and thought they could access the area.

“One of them walked around again and still couldn’t see the signs. I’m sure there must be some.”

“Some of the volunteers aren’t used to driving in the centre but they were doing it for the project.”

Grub Hub's Mitchie Alexander said volunteers had been fined

A councillor has also spoken out after his questioning revealed that two bus lane cameras in Brighton were responsible for fines totalling more than £2 million last year.

Conservative councillor Robert Nemeth said that the road signs were not clear enough for tens of thousands of drivers.

More than 54,000 drivers passed the camera covering the “bus gate” at York Place and St George’s Place, Brighton, generating almost £1.5 million alone.

At Gloucester Place, 29,500 drivers went past the camera by the corner of North Road, resulting in more than £800,000 in fines.

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The two cameras are at key sites in the controversial Valley Gardens revamp, where the new road layout introduced in 2020 restricted private vehicles to the eastern side of the area.

Members of Brighton and Hove City Council were shocked to learn that more than 9,600 drivers were caught out by the cameras last October, a rate of roughly two a minute.

Cllr Robert Nemeth asked for more detailed information when council’s the environment, transport and sustainability committee met earlier this month after raising concerns about the number of fines.

The details provided after the meeting showed that 168 appeals were upheld because of a technical issue with a street name in Gloucester Place and York Place in software and in a traffic order.

Councillor Robert Nemeth says signs are not clear enough

The council said that the traffic team had quickly rectified the problems.

Cllr Nemeth said: “The extremely high amounts of cash that is extracted from motorists suggests to me two concerning issues.

“The first is that unclear road signage is regularly installed in Brighton and Hove. The second is that unclear signage is rarely remedied once it is discovered that it is faulty.

“I will continue to question why so much signage here is so bad.”

• READ MORE: Petition launched to refund fines from Valley Gardens bus lane cameras

The council’s assistant director for transport Mark Prior told councillors that the signs in Valley Gardens went “above and beyond” what was required.

But more signs are on order, he said, to alert drivers to the bus gates and red-coloured road surface introduced at the bus gate junctions.