Kensington and Chelsea charges by zone and fuel type, £1.90 to £8.40 an hour. No uncontrolled streets, no visitor vouchers, and the Blue Badge does not apply.
Three things make parking here different from almost every other London borough, and all three cost visitors money.
- There are no uncontrolled streets. The council states it outright: during controlled hours, every visitor must be in a pay-by-phone bay or an off-street car park.
- The council does not issue visitor vouchers. There is no cheap way for a resident to park a guest’s car.
- The Blue Badge does not apply. Kensington and Chelsea is one of the central London boroughs outside the national scheme.
Everything below was checked against the council’s own pages on 24 August 2026.
What it costs: by zone and by what you drive
There are no flat hourly rates. The council prices pay-by-phone parking on two axes at once, the tariff zone and the fuel your car burns, and the spread between the cheapest and dearest combination is more than fourfold.
| Tariff zone | Electric or zero emission | Petrol and petrol hybrid | Diesel and diesel hybrid |
|---|---|---|---|
| Basic | £1.90 | £2.50 | £2.90 |
| Low | £3.10 | £4.10 | £4.70 |
| Medium | £4.40 | £5.90 | £6.60 |
| High | £5.60 | £7.40 | £8.40 |
Source: RBKC, PayByPhone. The council’s “petrol” column also covers hybrids, gas and vehicles whose fuel it does not know, so an unrecorded vehicle is charged at the petrol rate rather than the cheapest one. Which zone a street sits in is shown on the council’s parking tariff areas map, published in March 2026.
On top of the tariff, PayByPhone charges 10p per session, and again if you extend it. A booking confirmation text is 30p and an expiry reminder is another 30p. Those are optional; the 10p is not.
Maximum stay periods vary across the borough, so the sign at the bay is the authority on how long you can be there, not the app.
Where parking is free, and the trap in it
Pay-by-phone bays are free on Sundays, bank holidays, Good Friday, Easter Sunday, Christmas Day, Boxing Day and New Year’s Day. Outside controlled hours anyone can park in a resident permit bay, a pay-by-phone bay or on a single yellow line.
The exception is Holland Park. The council’s guidance says the Sunday concession excludes the Holland Park off-street car park and the majority of locations within Holland ward, where drivers are told to check the signs on street. The same exclusion applies to the car park on Easter Sunday. On ordinary bank holidays, though, the council says the Holland Park off-street car park is free. (RBKC, a guide to parking; RBKC, bank holiday parking)
A second trap: residents’ bay hours are not the same across the borough. The council’s own warning is to check the plate, because operational times for residents’ bays differ from street to street.
Two rules that never lift:
- Double yellow lines apply every day of the year, including Christmas Day.
- Restricted zones prohibit waiting at all times, with the entry and exit signposted.
Single yellow lines are the more forgiving case. Restrictions do not apply on bank holidays and public holidays unless the vehicle obstructs traffic flow, and they do not apply on Sundays, including Easter Sunday, or on Christmas Day. Where a single yellow line does operate on a Sunday it carries a separate plate, and even those do not apply on Christmas Day.
This bank holiday
On Monday 31 August 2026, the summer bank holiday and the second day of Notting Hill Carnival, the council says there is no enforcement in permit bays or pay-by-phone bays. Single yellow lines are also unenforced, with two exceptions: vehicles obstructing the flow of traffic, and single yellow lines in safety zones outside the restricted Carnival footprint. Temporary Carnival signs and controlled parking zone signs are going up on street. Our Carnival guide has the closures.
The one big car park: Hornton Street
The borough has very little off-street public parking. The main option is the car park under Kensington Town Hall, Hornton Street, W8 7NX, open 24 hours and run by Saba Parking rather than the council.
- 322 standard spaces, plus 4 Blue Badge bays, 4 electric charging bays and 15 motorcycle spaces
- maximum vehicle height 1.98m
- underground, barriered, pay on exit, with an on-site parking office on level B2
- outside the congestion charge zone, and a short walk from High Street Kensington station
- charging at the four EV points is free, though normal parking charges still apply
- card only, no cash, and American Express is not accepted
Saba’s published drive-in tariff, Monday to Friday:
| Stay | Charge |
|---|---|
| Up to 1 hour | £4.90 |
| Up to 2 hours | £9.80 |
| Up to 4 hours | £20.00 |
| Up to 12 hours | £30.00 |
| Up to 24 hours | £33.00 |
| Lost ticket, per day | £33.00 |
Source: Saba Parking, Kensington High Street Car Park. Saba publishes only weekday drive-in rates for this site, so we cannot state a weekend price. Note also that online and app bookings were suspended from 11 August 2026 for maintenance work starting 17 August, so at the time of writing only drive-in rates apply.
Enquiries go to the Hornton Street Parking Office on 0330 123 5247, not to the council.
Resident permits: a base fee plus your emissions
A resident permit is priced in parts. There is a flat base cost for issuing it, then an emissions charge on top, then surcharges.
| Element | 3 months | 6 months | 12 months |
|---|---|---|---|
| Base cost of a permit | £44 | £59 | £73 |
| Band 1: fully electric or zero emission, added to the base | £0 | £0 | £0 |
| Band 2: per CO2 g/km, added to the base | £0.25 | £0.50 | £1.00 |
| Unknown emissions, engine not over 1549cc | £36.75 | £73.50 | £147 |
| Unknown emissions, engine over 1549cc | £51 | £102 | £204 |
| Diesel surcharge, pre-Euro 6 or registered before 1 Sept 2015 | £24 | £47 | £94 |
| Second and subsequent car or van | £27 | £54 | £108 |
Source: RBKC, residents’ parking permit fees and charges.
The £1.00 per gram figure is the one to hold on to: on a 12-month permit, the emissions element is simply your car’s CO2 rating in pounds, added to the £73 base. A fully electric car pays the base and nothing else. The council runs a permit calculator that gives the exact price for a registration, valid for applications between 1 April 2026 and 31 March 2027.
Changing the vehicle on a permit costs £13, and so does processing a refund.
Motorcycles are cheaper and one option is free. A permit for resident permit motorcycle bays only costs nothing at any duration. A combined permit covering both motorcycle and resident permit bays is £104 for 12 months, and a fully electric motorcycle permit is £73.
Who can get one, and who cannot
You need your main permanent home in the borough, an unexpired driving licence, and to be the registered keeper, lessee or company-vehicle user. Students count if their family or university home is here. You cannot hold more than one car permit across any authority that allocates on residency, though you can hold a car permit and a motorcycle permit together. Some properties in the borough are classed permit free and get nothing at all. (RBKC, eligibility criteria)
Second home owners have their own permit, priced the same as a resident permit, but supply is capped. There are a maximum of 1,000 second home permits at any one time, first come first served, and the council does not run a waiting list. If the application will not proceed, that is usually why. (RBKC, second home permits)
Disabled parking: you need a Purple Badge, not a Blue one
This is the single most expensive thing to get wrong here. The national Blue Badge scheme does not apply in Kensington and Chelsea, along with Westminster, the City of London and parts of Camden.
Residents use the council’s own Purple Badge, which runs alongside the Blue Badge. To qualify you must already hold a Blue Badge and live, work or study in the borough. A Purple Badge lets you park:
- in a residents’ bay with no time limit
- in a paid-for bay, without paying, with no time limit
- on single yellow lines outside controlled hours
It does not cover single yellow lines during controlled hours, double yellow lines, suspended bays, doctors’, hospital or diplomat bays, or Blue Badge holders’ bays. There are specific restrictions on Notting Hill Gate and Holland Park Avenue. The Purple Badge is free; a Blue Badge costs £10. (RBKC, disabled parking for residents)
The council warns that disabled badge applications are running behind because of a backlog, and asks people not to chase for an update.
Visitors with a Blue Badge are not left with nothing. In a marked Blue Badge disabled parking bay you get up to four hours free during controlled hours, and unlimited time outside them. In an ordinary pay-by-phone bay you must buy a minimum of five minutes, after which you get one hour free on top of the time paid for, up to the maximum stay on the sign.
Near Chelsea and Westminster, the Royal Marsden, the Brompton and St Charles hospitals there is a better arrangement. Bays inside those zones are marked with an H on the parking sign, and a displayed Blue Badge lets you buy five minutes for every hour you want to stay, up to four hours. Pay for 20 minutes and you can stay four hours. Do not buy more than four hours that way. (RBKC, disabled parking for visitors)
Motorcycles
Shared use motorcycle bays are chargeable for visitors during controlled hours: £2 a day, £20 a month or £200 a year, bought at the time of parking. Fully electric motorcycles park free by booking a PayByPhone session at nil charge. A paid session moves with you to any other shared use solo motorcycle bay while it is still running.
If you get a ticket
Every road in the borough is Band A. The more serious contraventions carry £160, the less serious £110, with a 50 per cent discount if you pay within 14 days of issue.
If the car goes:
- release from a clamp: £100
- release from the car pound: £280
- storage: £55 per day
- disposal of a vehicle: £100
The discounted penalty has to be paid on top of the clamp or removal fee before the vehicle is released. (RBKC, parking penalty charges)
The council has also warned about text-message scams claiming to be parking fines, and about fake QR codes on parking signs. Neither the council nor PayByPhone will text you a payment link out of the blue.
Station parking
There is effectively none. Kensington Olympia has 60 spaces and no accessible spaces. West Brompton has no station car park at all. The borough’s other stations are Underground only. Anyone driving to a train here is better off with Hornton Street or a pay-by-phone bay. (National Rail, Kensington Olympia; National Rail, West Brompton)
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