Airport car crunch

Prices for short-term parking in Australia are among the world's most expensive, writes Patricia Maunder.

The shortcomings of airports are pointed out from time to time but among the loudest complaints in Australia is the cost of parking - especially since airports were progressively privatised from 1997, fuelling monopoly pricing accusations.

Consequently, a year ago the Federal Government directed the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) to monitor car park prices at Australia's five big airports, including Melbourne and Sydney.

The findings revealed that 11 per cent of the airports' revenue is from parking. In Melbourne that figure is 21 per cent, compared with Sydney's 7 per cent. Some of the findings are "consistent with airports having a monopoly position", the ACCC said.

But perhaps you get what you pay for? The report also notes that Melbourne has the highest satisfaction among car park customers, while Sydney has the lowest.

A Productivity Commission report two years ago found that big airports' car park charges are lower than CBD car parks, where a premium is paid for convenience.

Convenience versus price is the key: in Sydney, where the airport is about 10 kilometres to the city, just 13 per cent of passengers use the airport's car parks. In Melbourne, where the airport is further (22 kilometres) from the city, parking is a more likely choice.

"Due to the improvements and investment into parking, our growth [in usage] has been greater than passenger growth," says Melbourne Airport's communications manager, Emma Stenhouse. "If the prices weren't reasonable, this would not have occurred."

Deals on long-term airport parking, such as Melbourne Airport's $69 for seven days, are due to the range of on-site parking options and competition from off-site services shuttling customers to terminals.

However, these downward price pressures don't apply to short-term parking, leading to recent accusations that our airport parking is the world's most expensive.

Taking into account modest delays, you may need an hour's parking to collect a friend. In Melbourne that will cost $12, at London's Heathrow, #4.10 ($8.50) and New York's JFK, $US6 ($8.70). For a clearer picture of what an hour's parking costs, try the Big Mac index: in Melbourne it is equivalent to 3.48 Big Macs but only 1.79 in London and 1.68 in New York. Even worse is Sydney airport, where an hour costs $15 - or 4.35 Big Macs.

Spokesman for consumer organisation Choice, Christopher Zinn, says when Sydney airport's owner Macquarie considered expanding into British aviation "there were a lot of warnings to UK airports that Macquarie had gouged Australians on parking".

Zinn says there is a "fear that the privatisation of airports causes prices to significantly rise".

However, the price of parking in general may be the issue: though the report suggests airport parking looks good against CBD pricing, it also notes that capital-city parking rose 35 per cent in the five years to 2005-06.

TAKE OFF

In Melbourne, an hour's parking is equivalent to 3.48 and in Sydney 4.35 Big Macs.