New parking charges a bitter pill for CBD residents

new charges for on-street parking will be a bitter pill to swallow for many residents who live in Auckland’s central city. From July 1, parkers will face hourly rates all day and through the night, where previously parking had been free in many parts of the city on Sundays and outside the hours of 8am-6pm.

The new “Central City Paid Parking Zone” covers on-street parking in the downtown area bordered by State Highways 1 and 16, including Wynyard Quarter in the west, south to the Upper Queen St overpass and east to the border with Parnell.

It will be implemented by July, Auckland Transport (AT) said in a letter distributed to innercity residents.

AT told locals it has been instructed to take a “more commercial approach” to managing public assets to reduce the burden on ratepayers.

Providing free, unrestricted on-street parking in the evening and overnight also undercut private carparks, AT said.

“This [change] lines up with the concept that the storage of private asset [sic] such as vehicles on public road reserve should not be free.”

The difficult thing for residents is that it has been free and many will now need to make other arrangements or pay thousands of dollars a year to AT to park on the streets near where they live.

And on nearly every street in suburban Auckland, there are locals who park cars every night on the road for free. Inner-city residents would be right to wonder why they’re being treated differently.

A more practical approach for residents would be the introduction of parking zones that allow locals to park during certain times as long as they have a permit.

These zones exist in the suburbs like Parnell and Ponsonby that surround the central city and it’s reasonable to question why a similar scheme can’t be introduced in the CBD.

The pricing change will also impact visitors to the CBD. Students at the universities, for example, won’t be able to park for free at nights or Sundays if they are using facilities like the library or study spaces.

Shop owners or restaurants may also be concerned if the charges mean some people are discouraged from making the journey in.

Public transport advocates could argue that if the change encourages more people to ditch their cars for a bus or a train, then that is a good thing.

But public transport frequency and reliability is a problem (whether real or perceived) for many Aucklanders. Anecdotally, services appear to be improving — and the City Rail Link will hopefully lead to a step-change for those wedded to their cars.

Until then, many will stick to driving and AT will win no friends in making them pay for something that was previously free.