A spokeswoman for Leeds City Council, which owns the car park and has responsibility for its restrictions, said some “teething problems” had been experienced and the machines had stopped working for two days last week.

However, the problem has been corrected and all three machines were now up and running.

The restrictions were introduced in September and mean that people parking in the bottom half of the car park, closest to Morrisons supermarket, can only remain there for three hours.

Although parking remains free, motorists must get a ticket from the machines to show what time they arrived. Parking wardens will routinely check tickets and any cars that have been there longer than three hours will receive a fine.

The top end of the car park remains restriction-free.

The spokeswoman added that parking attendants always checked if machines were working before issuing tickets and none would be handed out if machines were found to be faulty.