Page 3427 - Week 08 - Wednesday, 17 August 2011
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The government will continue to manage parking demand in the city and town centres and, through a thorough master planning process, we will develop and implement an evidence-based approach to manage parking demand in local and group centres.
MS BRESNAN (Brindabella) (5.44): I acknowledge that residents in the ACT sometimes experience frustrations in finding parking. I also acknowledge that sometimes residents feel disgruntled at the amount that they have to pay for parking. There are also some areas of Canberra where there may be particular black spots when it comes to parking.
The Greens certainly agree that policymakers should be looking at the issue of parking. What we need is a sensible, considered approach to parking that takes into account all the ways that parking can impact on our city and citizens. These include impacts that are not always obvious and are far reaching, such as the long-term transport patterns of our city and the inclusion of people with disability or older people, or other people who cannot drive.
That is why our amendments moved by Ms Le Couteur ask for the finalisation of the ACT parking strategy and its release in conjunction with the transport strategy. We have also amended some of Mr Coe’s suggestions to take a more considered approach to the issues. ACT master planning needs to address car parking in a way that is consistent with the parking strategy, considers all modes of transport, including people who walk, and also considers overall impacts on the community.
Parking policy is, like most issues, a complex one. It is not a given that providing more parking, or lowering the cost of parking, will benefit Canberra or Canberrans. On the issue of free parking, this is something that is ever present in many American cities in particular, and in many ways it has had a negative impact on cities. Professor Donald Shoup, from the University of California’s Transportation Centre, has very clearly argued why the provision of free parking is actually very costly to communities. These issues are outlined in his book The High Cost of Free Parking. He is now helping to reform entrenched parking problems in cities such as Los Angeles.
Shoup’s analyses show how reducing the market price of parking and implementing minimum parking requirements provide subsidies that actually inflate parking demand. The minimum parking requirements act as an impact fee, which increases development costs by 10 times the impact fees for all other public purposes combined. He shows that eliminating minimum parking requirements will reduce the cost of urban development, improve urban design, reduce automobile dependency, improve the local economy and address urban sprawl.
The Greens cannot agree, and no thoughtful policymaker should agree, that it is good for the community if we just increase the amount of parking or decrease the cost of parking. These actually have to be very considered decisions and we have to be very mindful that parking policies do impact greatly on our city and its future.
What this Assembly actually needs to focus on—and this has obviously been a central tenet of the Greens’ agenda—is making our city more sustainable, making our
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