Resident ’parking mad’
Fine angers local who can’t get a car permit
A GOLD Coast City Council bid to free up on-street parking along Golden Four Dve at Bilinga is causing headaches for locals.
Warren Baker, who moved from Arundel six months ago with his family into their three-bedroom duplex with two garage spots at Bilinga, said he was ineligible for a resident parking permit because his home was not a “house’’.
“Yet under the council’s parking policy if we were a freestanding three-bedroom house with two off-street car parks, we would qualify for an on-street parking permit – go figure,” he said.
Resident parking permits are available for residents who live within a time-restricted parking area and have limited off-street parking. The permit allows residents to park for an unlimited period of time in a time-restricted parking area, subject to conditions.
“Instead we have to apply for and purchase a visitor’s permit for $88, which we must renew each year. And we can only have one,’’ he said. “My daughter just received a $75 fine for parking outside our property last week, when she forgot to move her car .”
In January the council enforced new parking conditions, from unlimited to strict four-hour timeslots, on the southern end of Golden Four Dve to deter jetsetters from taking up spaces.
“There were a lot of people parking their cars for days on end and walking over to the airport to avoid parking fees,” Mr Baker said.
“Now on any given day if you walk outside our property there are several hundred metres of potential car spaces are not being used.”
Mr Baker said he had approached the council several times but received no written response. It was only after persistent contact that an officer spoke to him.
Division 14 councillor Gail O’Neill agreed the policies, around duplex and apartment owners being ineligible for permits, were outdated.