City of Melbourne Council is proposing a new parking scheme that it says will make city parking simpler and fairer.
Melburnians are being invited to review the draft Parking and Kerbside Management Plan, and to have their say on how to improve the use of the city’s limited on-street kerbside space.
“Parking spaces are in high demand and used in many different ways – that’s why we want to hear from the community and stakeholders to make sure we get the balance right,” said Lord Mayor, Sally Capp.
The draft plan will help inform decisions on parking availability and is focused on boosting business confidence that both customers and delivery drivers will have parking options – all while keeping Melbourne moving, she said.
“Good parking management helps to keep our city moving – and we want to make parking simpler and fairer for people who need to drive into the city.”
“We’re aware that people can have parking anxiety, and we want to make sure everyone has an enjoyable experience in the city.”
The Lord Mayor said parking and kerbside space was in increasingly high demand in Melbourne – with competing needs from businesses, visitors, residents, delivery drivers, people with disability, construction, commercial passenger vehicles, car-share, public transport operators, motorcycle riders, events and parklets.
“We want to ensure that everyone who needs to drive into the city understands their options and has the best chance of finding a park either on-street or off-street,” she said.
The draft plan identifies a range of potential improvements to parking management, including:
- Simplified signage;
- Consistent layouts and durations for parking spaces;
- Education to improve knowledge of on-street and off-street parking options;
- Investigating data-led parking measures to boost availability, such as demand-based pricing.
More than 760,000 trips are made into and within the city by motor vehicles each day. The changing rhythm of the city has also altered parking patterns, with weekends now busier than weekdays in the CBD, creating a higher demand for Saturday and Sunday parking, Council said in a statement.
While demand is high, the City of Melbourne manages only 10,000 paid on-street parking spaces across the municipality – including 1,800 in the CBD – representing less than 5% of the total parking capacity.
Off-street parking makes up the vast majority of parking capacity and most of the available spaces at any one time, accounting for 90% of the total supply with 193,600 spaces in the city.
A recent survey found more than 80% of people who needed a car park during their last visit found it difficult to find an on-street parking space.
The draft plan does not propose any increase to the current maximum $7 hourly parking rate. It’s estimated that measures to simplify parking signage and conditions could result in a 10% decrease in parking fines, Council said.
“The City of Melbourne will continue to work closely with business groups and key stakeholders to explore measures to help improve the parking experience and better understand the impacts of any possible changes,” it said.
The draft Parking and Kerbside Management Plan will be considered by councillors at the 21 March Future Melbourne Committee meeting.
If endorsed, the plan will go to community consultation from 22 March to 19 April via Participate Melbourne.
