City parking costs rise: Courier Mail Submit comment By Emma Chalmers June 18, 2007 12:00am
THE cost of on-street parking in Brisbane is set to rise by 80¢ an hour.
Lord Mayor Campbell Newman's latest budget included the 33 per cent rise in parking fees from next month for the CBD and South Bank.
Drivers will need $3.20 to park for an hour in Brisbane CBD or at South Bank from July 1, compared with $2.40 an hour now.
It is Cr Newman's first parking fee increase since coming to City Hall, when he slashed $4 an hour parking costs in the CBD to $2.40.
"The reason I put it up to $3.20 is because the price of parking in Brisbane CBD has gone up significantly in the last few years and this is about the appropriate level in my view," Cr Newman said yesterday.
"I have kept it for three years without changing it. I've put it up and it is still significantly lower than it was half a decade ago.
"If the $4 had been kept and it simply ratcheted up with inflation every year it would now be about $4.55 or $4.60 an hour."
During his lord mayoral campaign, Cr Newman said he conducted an analysis of on-street parking and secure parking prices in Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne.
He found Brisbane was "out of whack" with what was happening interstate and suggested the-then Brisbane City Council administration was "price gouging".
He made a commitment to drop the price to $2.40. That promise was honoured in his first budget as lord mayor.
In other areas of the city, Fortitude Valley, Spring Hill and Petrie Terrace, it will cost $1.60 an hour to park a car on the roadside up from $1.20.
An 11-hour meter in Newstead and Bowen Hills will cost $1.60 for each three-hour and 40-minute period, up from $1.20, and an 11-hour meter in the Valley and Milton will need $1.60 for every two hours and 45 minutes.
A four-hour meter in traffic areas south of the river will cost $1.60 an hour and an 11-hour meter $1.60 for each two-hour and 45-minute period.
Brisbane City Council is also reviewing car parking times and limits in city hot spots.
The review announced in March was to consider several car park congestion points including Woolloongabba, West End, Milton, Paddington, Newstead and Teneriffe.