Community & Business
27 May, 2024
TRC parking fee increases to act as deterrent
Toowoomba Regional Council looks set to collect an additional $230,000 to Council’s Parking Enforcement annual income, based on 2022/23 parking infringement statistics, if proposed changes to parking fees are adopted.
Author of the report, council senior officer Paul Samios, said the proposed parking fee increases were designed to act as a deterrent to illegal parking and not as a revenue raising device.
Mr Samios argued that the current parking fines do not act as sufficient a deterrent against illegal parking because people will evaluate the current cost of parking against the risk of being caught and the cost of compliance.
He said at the moment it is cheaper to take the risk of infringement rather than pay the parking fee.
Under the proposed increases the cost of a parking payment offence will increase from $61 to $100.
The same offence on the Sunshine Coast is $46 while in Brisbane it is $116.
The cost of overstaying in a parking space will increase from $71 to $100 while the same offence on the Sunshine Coast is $46 and in Brisbane $116.
It will be wise to make sure you do not park illegally in a disability parking space as the fine will go from $309 to $464 while the same offence in Cairns is $267 and in Brisbane a massive $615.
The report stated: “It should be noted that parking penalties are a deterrent, and whilst it is useful to have a justifiable position of benchmarking against other Councils to offset revenue raising accusations, it may be more useful to benchmark against what penalty will change the appetite of drivers to park illegally or overstay a paid parking space.
Further work will occur in the parking regulation team to establish useful ways of measuring non-compliance and whether increasing penalty amounts has an impact on parking outcomes.”
The report seemingly made no mention of whether it has become easier or more difficult to find a parking space in the Toowoomba CBD over the last few years.
With the population increase in the Toowoomba region in recent years it would be useful to know if there has been a corresponding increase in legal parking spaces made available over the same period.
Retailers would no doubt not want to see the cost of parking becoming a deterrent to people who want to go shopping in the CBD.
Councillors voted unanimously at Council’s committee meeting on 15th May to endorse the draft amendments to TRC’s parking subordinate local laws.
Feedback will now be taken as the proposal is endorsed.
