Parking crisis at Christchurch Hospital
Staff, visitors, patients and construction workers battle daily over scarce car parks near Christchurch Hospital and this week some patients missed their appointments when cricket spectators took car spaces at the hospital’s park-and-ride service. Cate Br
When catering assistant, or ‘‘tea lady’’, Sue* arrives for work at 5am, it is pitch black. Her 12-hour shift at Christchurch Hospital starts at 6.30am, but to nab one of the few unmetered car parks on Riccarton Ave she has to arrive an hour and a half early.
Sue is one of about 4000 staff, visitors and patients at the hospital each day and among hundreds of staff battling it out over car parks.
‘‘Usually there’s nobody around when I pull up. It’s when I get out of the car that they all start coming and I’m thinking oh, thank Christ I got that park.’’
Construction workers have started vying for the same parks and some have been seen sleeping in their cars on Riccarton Ave.
Up to 2000 construction workers are estimated to be working in the area over the next year at least.
For visitors and patients a parkand-ride service from Deans Ave has replaced a now demolished multi-storey car park opposite the hospital.
Of the Deans Ave car park’s 800 spaces, 300 are reserved for hospital users.
Views on the park-and-ride service are mixed.
When The Press visited this week, Colin Black had just returned to the car park on the shuttle from a hospital appointment. His leg is still fragile and with crutches he makes his way slowly from the shuttle stop back to his car over the uneven, unsealed ground.
The service was a good ‘‘makeshift measure’’ but a better long-term solution was needed, Black said.
‘‘It’s very important that people in charge take a hard look at this and provide a car park for people unfortunate enough to have to go to the hospital.’’
Others using the service couldn’t fault it.
A woman who didn’t want to be named uses the service regularly to take her Down syndrome daughter to appointments.
‘‘It’s more convenient because I know there will be a car park and I don’t have to pay the meter.’’
The shuttle buses are not equipped to take people in wheelchairs, so they either have to be dropped off at the hospital or use one of 26 mobility spaces at the hospital.
Other options for visitors and patients driving to the hospital are spaces on nearby streets or one of two private car parks on empty sites at Oxford Tce.
The city council has no parking buildings near the hospital, with the closest one on Lichfield St.
Safety concerns for night staff
As road works and construction increases, car spaces near the hospital are decreasing – forcing staff and visitors to park farther and farther away.
Staff can use the Deans Ave car park but not the shuttle bus to the hospital. If they park there and are on an afternoon shift, they end up having to walk through North Hagley park in the dead of night at shift’s end.
Two incidents have been reported to the Canterbury District Health Board (CDHB) in the past 18 months, chief executive David Meates said.
A nurse was verbally abused after she challenged some youths who were acting suspiciously as she was walking to her car.
Another nurse was accosted by someone who tried to take her bag.
‘‘She managed to run away, a bit shaken but fortunately unhurt,’’ Meates said.
Despite pleading their case numerous times, requests for a response to concerns made by the New Zealand Nursing Organisation (NZNO) have ‘‘contained very little information for staff’’, organiser Christin Watson said.
‘‘It is very frustrating as our members want to know what the DHB is planning to do to fix these issues.’’
Meates said the board took any threats against staff ‘‘extremely seriously’’.
He said security guards do nightly patrols about 11pm and were available to escort staff to their cars.
Over 500 staff are on waiting lists for two staff car-parking buildings. Those without access to the buildings often end up parking as far away as Moorhouse Ave.
Watson said there are only four security staff on duty overnight at the hospital and Meates’ suggestion of escorts was not realistic.
This week nursing union members, tired of the stalling, started a petition asking hospital managers to provide better carparking options.
Who’s in charge?
CDHB began planning for a massive redevelopment of Christchurch Hospital back in 2008.
The new Christchurch Hospital acute services building (ASB) and a multi-storey outpatients building are due to be completed by mid2017.
Two public car parks are planned for the hospital, one onsite and a larger one off-site, but nearby.
After the earthquakes the Ministry of Health became involved in the project through the establishment of the hospital redevelopment partnership group (HRPG).
Despite this, the CDHB was tasked with finding a private developer to build and operate a larger public car park.
Last year the HRPG took over responsibility for this when the DHB was ‘‘unable to secure private interest’’ , ministry director of critical projects Michael Hundleby said.
It appears little has been done since then.
‘‘In relation to the larger car park (which we will be looking for private developers to deliver), we are yet to scope the exact size and cost of this,’’ Hundleby said.
He said a priority for the HRPG this year would be to work with the CDHB, council and other entities such as Otakaro to ‘‘determine what supply and demand will be for parking and public transport in the area with other developments, like Metro Sports, under way’’.
Meates said private developers approached to build a car park said it was uneconomic on the CDHB-owned land where the former car park was.
He insists parking was always acknowledged to be a ‘‘core component of the hospital redevelopment’’.
The CDHB had identified that 1400 car parks in total would be needed for the hospital campus, including 240 parks on the hospital site.
CDHB was looking at solutions to the problem in the meantime, including an extension of the parkand-ride service for staff, Meates said.
‘‘The DHB recognises it is a critical issue and a satisfactory solution will be some years away.’’
Board member Aaron Keown said he has raised the issue of parking several times, but other board members and management were simply not interested.
The first design members saw for the ASB contained no parking at all, Keown said.
A second design contained a huge multistorey car park which made the hospital ‘‘look awful’’ and this was followed up by the current design, which allows for a smaller car park in the same location.
The number of spaces allocated on site have reduced from 200 to 50, with about 20 more spaces under ground.
Keown said the issue of carparking at the hospital has not been discussed at CDHB meetings.
‘‘It’s not a priority for the board . . . it does not float their boat.’’
‘‘It’s very important that people in charge take a hard look at this and provide a car park for people unfortunate enough to have to go to the hospital.’’ Colin Black