A mum who started a petition to get short-stay parking spaces outside the sorting office in Ashford says she hopes they can be installed by Christmas after councillors showed support for the idea.

More than 3,000 people signed a petition to install three 15-minute parking bays outside the Royal Mail office in Tannery Lane – something residents have long called for at the site which is surrounded by double-yellow lines.

The petition to Royal Mail and Ashford Borough Council (ABC) was started by chef and mother-of-three Stephanie Roberts in January and rapidly gained support online.

Now councillors on Ashford’s joint transportation board have agreed to explore all options.

Ms Roberts said: “It is brilliant to see now it has been supported by those who are able to do so.

“It makes it feel like the local authority is listening to us.

“It would definitely be nice to have it before the Christmas rush because that is what stimulated my wish to start a petition in the first place.

“It’s such a busy time and it would just make life so much easier.”

Councillors were overwhelmingly in favour of the scheme at a meeting last month and have agreed to fund a traffic regulation order to make sure the new bays will be safe.

Once this is done, Cllr Paul Bartlett (Con), deputy leader at ABC, hopes the scheme can progress further at the next meeting in September.

He added: “There was a bit of discussion about whether it should be two or three bays, we settled on our preferences for three but it does depend on a safety audit.

“There was a desire for at least one of the bays to be for disabled drivers only, but we have said we don’t want that because if you are a blue badge holder, you are allowed to park on the double-yellows there anyway and that will remain unchanged.

“There is much less traffic using Tannery Lane so I fully accept that in years gone by there may have been an argument for double-yellow lines but times have changed.”

Cllr Bartlett previously hoped a compromise of at least two spaces could be reached as the road has been quieter since Kent Wool Growers closed.

He added: “There might be plans to develop that land in the future but those plans are moving at a glacial pace so we don’t know what will happen.

“We will worry about it when any plans actually come forward.”