Parking fees set to rise

Parking in Auckland will be more expensive from July 1 if an Auckland Transport budget plan goes ahead.

At the Transport and Infrastructure Committee on May 18, members gave feedback on Auckland Transport’s (AT) draft statement of intent.

Mayor Wayne Brown said parking fees needed to rise to match the market price.

“I don’t know why we are subsidising people to park in the city centre,” Brown said.

He said there was also an issue with parking fines, which required government intervention in order to change.

“At present, the parking fines are less than the parking charge in some places.”

Cr Julie Fairey wanted to know what the increased revenue would be spent on.

AT’s finance executive general manager Mark Laing said that AT currently had a $30 million hole in parking revenue.

“The increase is effectively plugging a hole in the budget. That is necessary to help us deliver on the $375 million hole in the council budget,” Laing said.

“We are reliant on that increase to actually help us deliver on our budget.”