Wellington Parking - They are about to clamp down on bike parking

[cheshirecat]

Hi
I'd just like to say it's great you (John as representing the council) are engaging in this forum and taking time to respond. I like the initiative of trying to find extra spaces with companies.

Just my 2 cents worth anyway

M

[caseye]

Yes jon, welcome to KB, I hope the boys and girls haven't given you too hard a time .Your personal approach just might win freinds and influence people.
A commitment to ask us, or any motorcycle associations before doing something might go a long way towards establishing a workable relationship.

[rustic101]

Well done John, thank you for representing the WCC and being part of the group. Also for taking the time to explain rather than taking a brick bat approach.

My employer informally and unofficially provides free parking to riders. This aside I have noticed (and its my perception)… WCC Parking revenue is down a few hundred thousands of dollars for the last financial year which I think was just short of 9.5 million??. As a result I have witnessed more and more free space being converted into coupon parking.

Prior to getting back onto a bike I use to park up Wadestown Road and a few other places for free and walk into town. However these spaces are now ALL coupon parking??? What strikes me is that these spaces are a fair distance from the ‘Town Belt’ and are not in residential areas in term of creating an obstruction for home owners.

So my perception is this is a move to increase revenue for WCC, albeit after providing an 'education and notification campaign'.

[James Deuce]

My approach (contrary to me predecessors) is to focus on engineering first (i.e. getting teh road as right as we can get it) and then on education, rather than jumping straight into an enforcement approach.

Council does have a responsibility to promote the safety of road users as the Road Controlling Authority for Wellington City. We run many road safety campaigns in conjunction with the NZ Transport Agency and the Police.

You'd do better to drop the campaigns and concentrate on putting a tarmac coating on road based metal hatch covers and manhole covers. Purely from a motorcyclist's perspective. Spend your existing budget on concrete outcomes rather than blue sky words and programmes and please avoid levying extra from already over-burdened ratepayers too thanks.

The rest of you suck ups can drop the act too. You're not normally this polite with n00bs EVER.

[Nasty]

Sent you a PM

If it was to Jon note he won't be able to respond to PMs until he has been on KB for five days.

[bogan]

Just a thought, is there any other cities very similar to welli? in geogrphy, poulation, demographic etc. Could then just copy whatever works.

[Nasty]

Just a thought, is there any other cities very similar to welli? in geogrphy, poulation, demographic etc. Could then just copy whatever works.

Find another city to model it on - where they have addressed this and it worked ... Wellington itself is quite unique .. so good luck!

[jellywrestler]

jon, its great to see you here on kiwibiker (or kiwibitcher as some see it) and fronting up to the people. Has the council thought of identifying footpath areas where parking a bike would be ok and making up a small plate attached to the ground stating its an authorised bike park and seeing how this would work?

[James Deuce]

Did you read and understand what he is saying Jellywrestler?

The council is going to make street parking for motorcycles time limited. Anything not time limited will be metered. Parking buildings are being suggested as alternates, but because they aren't council parking buildings they will cost money.

Footpath parking will earn you a ticket. They aren't interested in entertaining the idea they are after revenue.

[FatHead]

Having now read the full story on this issue from Mr Visser (thank you by the way) I can understand where the council is coming from and hope that a solution can be reached that benefits all. Personally I dont have an issue with paying a small amount for parking either in a parking building or on the side of the road. I expect that now I am going to get slammed for putting this out there but hey it may be a simple and less painful solution than getting hit with a parking fine. Anyway lets not dump on Mr Visser he is after all trying to do his job and it is far better we have some sort of feedback option than the council just doing what they please at the expense of the local motorcycle fraternity.

[Jon Visser]

My guess is that the $1m is loss of parking meter revenue. Edit: In fact $4 per hour X 8 hours a day X ~ 240 working days a year X 170 car parks = $1,305 600 in revenue!

That calculation is about right Lurch but determines the potential revenue we could earn. In order to fairly determine the "lost revenue" we then have to multiply it by the "average occupancy rate" and the "payment compliance rate" (not everyone fweeds the meter :-). For the Wellingotn CBD these two rates are typically well over 90%, hence we adopt a slightly more conservative estimate of $6k per car park.

[Lurch]

I still don't see the problem.

Put in more bike parks = less parking meter income but saves on roading expansion costs, public transport costs and rip off parking companies making money for being assholes. All whilst keeping bikes off footpaths and motocyclist from revolting.... even the revolting ones.

[Lurch]

That calculation is about right Lurch but determines the potential revenue we could earn.

It was a gross generalisation, and overestimate but I'm glad it was a reasonable example.

[James Deuce]

Having now read the full story on this issue from Mr Visser (thank you by the way) I can understand where the council is coming from and hope that a solution can be reached that benefits all. Personally I dont have an issue with paying a small amount for parking either in a parking building or on the side of the road. I expect that now I am going to get slammed for putting this out there but hey it may be a simple and less painful solution than getting hit with a parking fine. Anyway lets not dump on Mr Visser he is after all trying to do his job and it is far better we have some sort of feedback option than the council just doing what they please at the expense of the local motorcycle fraternity.

It won't be a small amount. It will be enough to push the erquation for affordable commuting vs public transport firmly into the public transport arena.

There is little point expecting the outcome to be beneficial for anyone except WCC and Wilson Parking. Anyone expecting Wilson Parking to charge less for an individual bike park than a cark park really doesn't understand their business model.

If Mr Visser was interested in inner city road safety he'd be looking at clamping down on jay walking, speeding buses on Lambton Quay and making sure that the coefficient of friction for road access covers was something a little better than ice.

[Jon Visser]

This aside I have noticed (and its my perception)… WCC Parking revenue is down a few hundred thousands of dollars for the last financial year which I think was just short of 9.5 million??. As a result I have witnessed more and more free space being converted into coupon parking.

Prior to getting back onto a bike I use to park up Wadestown Road and a few other places for free and walk into town. However these spaces are now ALL coupon parking??? What strikes me is that these spaces are a fair distance from the ‘Town Belt’ and are not in residential areas in term of creating an obstruction for home owners.

Resident and Coupon parking areas have not been reviewed for many years and a report went to Council on 20 August to suggest a few changes. On 14 September we will enter into public consultation on those schemes. Income for those schemes is up, but as for motorcycle parking everyone wants more space and residents are finding it harder to find a park near their home so they all want changes in their favour. One of the proposed changes is to align resident parking with residential areas in the District Plan because, as you say, some of these areas are currently not residential (zone boundaries and usage change over time). If you're interested, keep an eye out for that public consultation - it is an opportunity for people to be heard.

So my perception is this is a move to increase revenue for WCC, albeit after providing an 'education and notification campaign'.

Quite the opposite. I can assure you that this "education" campaign is costing the ratepayers a lot more than an "enforcement" campaign would. Those who know me can verify that while some people have suggested introducing time restrictions or fees for on-road motorcycle parking, I am very much against that in principle. If we can all work together to achieve a "good" street environment that keeps everyone happy without needing to resort to enforcement or fees, that would be the ideal outcome. And if, as part of that solution, people shift to public or private parking garages (as we are promoting), then the Council will not receive any of that revenue.

I am also not shy about admitting that parking, in general, is very much about revenue. Revenue is used as a tool to generate frequency of parking turnover so that many people can share a limited amenity. Revenue is used as a tool to deter people from offending. Revenue is collected to recover the costs of providing, maintaining and managing the asset upon which people park. All of this revenue offsets rates such that the users of parking spaces (and not ratepayers who don't own a car) pay for that amenity. Every single major city in the world uses revenue in this manner to manage parking, despite all the possible alternatives considered. With regard to motorcycle parking, it is therefore quite unique in that most cities provide some spaces for free, and I'd like to work together to keep it that way.

Someone has asked what overseas cities we can compare Wellington to. Although Wellington appears quite unique, we do often use San Fransisco and Monte Carlo as cities that share many of the geographical features and challenges as Wellington (i.e. highly compact CBD with a waterfront on one side and steep narrow roads on the other).