Drivers spend 2 days a year trying to park

MOTORISTS spend an average of 44 hours a year searching for a parking space.

This costs £733 in time and fuel, or £23 billion to the nation, a study shows.

London was ranked the worst city for parking, as drivers waste as much as 67 hours a year, costing them £1,104.

It was followed by Belfast (56 hours and £928), Leeds (47 hours and £772) and Bristol (46 hours and £768).

Birmingham, Cardiff, Manchester, Glasgow, Edinburgh and Southampton completed the top ten.

The study, by traffic data supplier Inrix, found that the total annual cost of time spent searching for a space, money overspent for parking, and tickets for overstaying was more than £30billion.

The problem is so bad that 40 per cent of motorists avoid driving to the shops, while 25 per cent won’t drive to the GP.

The British findings came from Inrix’s database of 8,700 cities in more than 100 countries, combined with a recent survey of 7,035 drivers in ten UK cities.

Dr Graham Cookson, chief economist at Inrix, said the £30billion cost ‘is not only borne by drivers but also by local economies as people avoid shops due to parking issues’.

He said parking firms and councils must make it easier for drivers to find spaces by improving information about where they are, adding: ‘Parking pain will only get worse until technology is fully embraced.’