Business outrage over cycling lanes
Owners say there is no parking for their customers
STAFF at several Woodstock businesses were slapped with R1 000 fines for parking in the dedicated cycle lanes in Albert Road following the City of Cape Town’s clampdown yesterday. But they’ve accused the city of not consulting with them before painting the cycle lanes that deprived them of parking space, and could cost them thousands of rand in lost income.
Kaylynn Lewin, of a sound and lighting business in Woodstock, said the dedicated lanes, which formed part of the city’s R300 million non-motorised transport plan, have taken up “literally half of the road”. Businesses already battling with the lack of parking in Woodstock were now being forced to park in the narrow side streets further away from their premises.
“We are not against cyclists having their own lanes and we do care about their safety, but there was no plan in place for alternative parking space for our customers and clients. There is parking available on the one
side of the road, but those are now being filled by either employees who work in the area or shop owners and their staff, and this leaves absolutely no room for customers to park their vehicles.”
Two people from Lewin’s company were each fined R1 000 yesterday for parking in the green cycle lane.
Lewin is heading up a campaign to petition mayor Patricia de Lille about businesses’ concerns.
“We are all for cyclists being safe but at the end of the day we are losing a lot of money.”
But the city’s mayoral committee member for Transport for Cape Town, Brett Herron, said the shortage of on-street parking in business areas across the city was one of the reasons it was encouraging different modes of transport such as cycling and the MyCiTi service.
“That said, creating more on-street parking is not the solution in a growing city such as Cape Town with the unique typography where we have Table Mountain on one side and the ocean on the other as this limits the available space for expanding our road network. The only lasting and viable solution is for residents to abandon their private vehicles for other modes of transport.”
The dedicated cycling lanes on both sides of the road were introduced in 2014 to create a safe and accessible route for cyclists. But Lewin said that if one were to install a time lapse camera along the road, one would see that few cyclists used the dedicated lane.
Furthermore, many businesses were aggrieved that they were not informed of the city’s plans or invited to be part of the consultation process when the project was first mooted.
Comments on social media reflected similar concerns.
“To be fair, up until a few months ago it was almost impossible to find parking in busy commercial areas like Woodstock and Salt River. With the introduction of these cycle lanes, the amount of parking available has just been cut in half. It wasn’t very well thought out, in my opinion.”
When Lewin took to social media to complain about her colleague’s fine, Premier Helen Zille weighed in on the debate with the following tweet: “Let me be quite frank. It should have been double. Show consideration and respect for others, and play by the rules.”
In another exchange on social media, Herron explained that non-motorised transport movement was far better for retail than cars. He said the cycling lanes took up a small part of the road and it was “not unreasonable” to ask motorists to share.
The owner of an upholstery business, also in Woodstock, was also fined R1 000 yesterday when he parked his bakkie in front of the shop to offload a couch.
The business has been in Woodstock for 10 years, and most of the customers drove to the store from outside of the area, said the co-owner, who asked not to be named. “The cyclists don’t pay the same fees as us car owners and yet we are being punished.”
Customers were concerned about the safety of their cars and often did not want to park too far from the entrance.
The business owner also claimed that the city’s cycling lanes were foisted upon shops in the area, without proper consultation.
But Herron said the planning and design of the cycle lane through Woodstock and Salt River was informed by a public participation process.