Southend Council wants views on 26 lamppost chargers in Leigh and Milton wards, most with an EV-only bay beside them. The consultation closes on 18 November.

Residents in Leigh and Milton wards have until Wednesday 18 November to comment on plans for 26 new lamppost electric vehicle chargers in their streets.

The council’s consultation page lists 20 proposed sites in Leigh ward and six in Milton ward. All but one would come with a parking bay beside the lamppost that only electric vehicles could use while charging.

The chargers are part of the council’s deal with the operator Zest. The council says it will deliver “a minimum of 3,000 chargepoints across Southend in a phased approach over the 15-year contract term”, at “no cost to the Council or its residents” (Southend-on-Sea City Council, Your Say).

The proposed sites

The council has published a photo of each spot. The addresses are given as the nearest house number.

Milton ward (six sites):

  • St Johns Road, at the junction with Hamlet Court Road
  • 19 Hadleigh Road
  • 103 Queens Road
  • 71 Queens Road
  • 75 Ashburnham Road
  • 17 Quebec Avenue

Leigh ward (20 sites):

Street Sites
Leighton Avenue 114, 85, 55 and 21
Leigh Hall Road 58 and 29
Oakleigh Park Drive 69 and 24
Dawlish Drive 36 and 3
Victoria Drive 31
Torquay Drive 23
Leigham Court Drive 50
West Street 15
North Street 20
East Street 21
Alexandra Road 13 (charger only, no EV-only bay shown)
Maple Avenue 12
Victor Road 17
Hadleigh Road 21

The site lists come from the Milton and Leigh photo galleries on the consultation page.

What the EV-only bays would mean

The bays would be set up under experimental traffic orders, which let the council trial a parking change before deciding whether to keep it. The council says:

  • each bay could be used only by an electric vehicle “while actively charging”
  • the trial would last 18 months
  • the formal objection period runs for the first six months of each order

So a petrol or diesel car could no longer park in that space during the trial. That is the part most likely to matter on streets where parking is already tight.

Which wards are next

Thorpe ward’s consultation closed on 19 October. Leigh and Milton are open now. The council lists the other 14 wards as “upcoming”, without dates:

  • Belfairs, Blenheim Park, Chalkwell, Eastwood Park, Kursaal, Prittlewell and St Laurence
  • St Lukes, Shoeburyness, Southchurch, Victoria, West Leigh, West Shoebury and Westborough

The chargers range from 5kW lamppost and bollard units to rapid chargers of 50 to 160kW, according to the council. The rollout is funded through the Government’s Local Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (LEVI) programme, aimed at drivers who have no off-street parking. When the council announced the Zest deal in November 2025, it put the LEVI funding at £1.4 million (Southend-on-Sea City Council, 18 November 2025). The first Zest chargers went live at Alexandra Street car park in August.

What it means for you

If you live on one of the streets above, check the photo of your spot on the consultation page. It shows the lamppost and the bay that would become EV-only.

You can respond by Wednesday 18 November in three ways:

  • the Milton or Leigh ward survey on the council’s Your Say page
  • email to SouthendEVSolutions@southend.gov.uk
  • post to Southend-on-Sea City Council, Environmental and Place, PO Box 6, Civic Centre, Victoria Avenue, Southend-on-Sea, SS2 6ER

If the bays go ahead, you get a second chance to object during the first six months of the trial.