Parking Barton Style

MightyJoe said :

mezza76 said :

This has been a disaster for 10 years and counting. It’s only the last 3 has been more feral than previously but it’s never been ‘good’.
I agree… pity Department’s won’t SS as it incurs FBT…..

And also, where do you put it? Great idea in principle, the problem is that the land will cost $x million to buy and noone will want to put only a carpark on it… not enough return on investment.

It’ll be better when Segway’s are legalised for denizens of Canberra, I’ll ride one from the light rail station from Gungahlin to the City…. 🙂

For what it’s worth I don’t understand why the NCA/ACT Govt don’t build two large and secure multistory carparks, allow Departments to salary package the cost of staff, and pay park/restrict & police the rest. Everyone gets a spot, its cheap and secure from theft (which is common in the Triangle carparks), the budget bottomline for the capital is paid off by selling it to private providers and the only cost is the forgone taxation revenue which would be miniscule by Commonwealth standards. Win-win policy all round.

* FBT has no underlying cash impact on the Commonwealth. It’s technically a money churn (funding to departments who in turn, give money back to consolidated revenue). Departments in Civic already salary package car parking (on a departmental basis) in some instances – so it should be something that the triangle agencies do to smooth it over with the employees and unions.
* Replace car parks at York Park (behind PM&C) and next to Treasury. Locations will be problematic as the NCA will scream about the negative heritage issues. It’s either that or spend a lot of extra $ putting them underground. But frankly – there are so many eyesore car parks in this town (eg Russell anyone?) a couple of multistory numbers aren’t going to make the difference.
* It’s all Commonwealth land – so it shouldnt cost anything. The Commonwealth can lease it to a private provider who would provide the construction and operation (and get a decent commercial return of a captive market) …well, that’s my theory.
* Segways will be worse than cyclists 😉

mezza76 said :

This has been a disaster for 10 years and counting. It’s only the last 3 has been more feral than previously but it’s never been ‘good’.
I agree… pity Department’s won’t SS as it incurs FBT…..

And also, where do you put it? Great idea in principle, the problem is that the land will cost $x million to buy and noone will want to put only a carpark on it… not enough return on investment.

It’ll be better when Segway’s are legalised for denizens of Canberra, I’ll ride one from the light rail station from Gungahlin to the City…. 🙂

For what it’s worth I don’t understand why the NCA/ACT Govt don’t build two large and secure multistory carparks, allow Departments to salary package the cost of staff, and pay park/restrict & police the rest. Everyone gets a spot, its cheap and secure from theft (which is common in the Triangle carparks), the budget bottomline for the capital is paid off by selling it to private providers and the only cost is the forgone taxation revenue which would be miniscule by Commonwealth standards. Win-win policy all round.

This has been a disaster for 10 years and counting. It’s only the last 3 has been more feral than previously but it’s never been ‘good’.

For what it’s worth I don’t understand why the NCA/ACT Govt don’t build two large and secure multistory carparks, allow Departments to salary package the cost of staff, and pay park/restrict & police the rest. Everyone gets a spot, its cheap and secure from theft (which is common in the Triangle carparks), the budget bottomline for the capital is paid off by selling it to private providers and the only cost is the forgone taxation revenue which would be miniscule by Commonwealth standards. Win-win policy all round.

MightyJoe said :

Thats the Treasury (Hyatt / Albert Hall) side parking zone and not the Forrest / Barton side. Although what that does is force the Treasury people to park @ Westblock, JGB and National Library / Questacon forcing the public to not have parking at the local attractions.

its a huge crap fight whichever way you look at though, too many cars for not enought space.

aidan said :

I’ve met a few people who parked (for free) in and around the Parli triangle and then biked/scooted/skated into Civic. In at least one case it would certainly have been considerably quicker for them to cycle directly to work from their home (admittedly they may well no longer do this as parking is now much more difficult).

They have always driven to work. Finding carparks becomes harder, they are further away, more expensive, but they do not rethink the original assumption that they always drive their car.

It can be challenging to change well established habits/thought patterns.

Those lazy tourists should take advantage of Canberra’s fantasic public transport system. They might even lose some inches off their waistlines during their stay.

Last time i tried a bus to MEB, I waited greater than 15mins after the scheduled departure time (despite gettting there 10mins before) to no avail. from memory, only 3 buses service the triangle and get to MEB (well one was at kings ave) so, I would need to catch a 7:30 bus from Amaroo and I’d arrive @ 9am for work…. yeah, real great use of my time. Car thanks.

m@ said :

HenryBG said :

banco said :

c_c said :

m@ said :

Probably has more to do with the loss of parking spaces around the Barton/Forrest area to new office buildings…

I’m not buying that. I though a lot of the new office buildings had underground parking that at least equalled in capacity the parking lost by their construction. If any don’t, then the NCA royally screwed up their planning approvals.

There’s been a quite deliberate policy of reducing the number of parks in Barton to try to force more people on to the crappy bus system.

The parliamentary triangle is one of the easiest and most convenient places to get to by bus.
I’m even happy to catch a bus there just for a meeting.

Blaming the bus system for your own personal laziness is pathetic. Walking that extra kilometre per day to and from bus stops might help your mental state as well as your waistline

The bus service is easy and convenient from Civic, certainly, and even ok to/from the inner north – though hardly as convenient as it should be given the small distances involved. I get to work much quicker on the days I cycle than the days I bus, especially if I miss the direct service home and have to change in Civic. But for anyone further out, busses are a bit of a non-option.

None of that excuses the illegal parking though…

HenryBG said :

banco said :

c_c said :

m@ said :

Probably has more to do with the loss of parking spaces around the Barton/Forrest area to new office buildings…

I’m not buying that. I though a lot of the new office buildings had underground parking that at least equalled in capacity the parking lost by their construction. If any don’t, then the NCA royally screwed up their planning approvals.

There’s been a quite deliberate policy of reducing the number of parks in Barton to try to force more people on to the crappy bus system.

The parliamentary triangle is one of the easiest and most convenient places to get to by bus.
I’m even happy to catch a bus there just for a meeting.

Blaming the bus system for your own personal laziness is pathetic. Walking that extra kilometre per day to and from bus stops might help your mental state as well as your waistline

The bus service is easy and convenient from Civic, certainly, and even ok to/from the inner north – though hardly as convenient as it should be given the small distances involved. I get to work much quicker on the days I cycle than the days I bus, especially if I miss the direct service home and have to change in Civic. But for anyone further out, busses are a bit of a non-option.

None of that excuses the illegal parking though…

Thats the Treasury (Hyatt / Albert Hall) side parking zone and not the Forrest / Barton side. Although what that does is force the Treasury people to park @ Westblock, JGB and National Library / Questacon forcing the public to not have parking at the local attractions.

its a huge crap fight whichever way you look at though, too many cars for not enought space.

aidan said :

I’ve met a few people who parked (for free) in and around the Parli triangle and then biked/scooted/skated into Civic. In at least one case it would certainly have been considerably quicker for them to cycle directly to work from their home (admittedly they may well no longer do this as parking is now much more difficult).

They have always driven to work. Finding carparks becomes harder, they are further away, more expensive, but they do not rethink the original assumption that they always drive their car.

It can be challenging to change well established habits/thought patterns.

The parking spots between Minter Ellison and Broadband are not open to everyone, rather only people with passes letting you in to the parking.

And whilst there is an underground parking facility in the area under most buildings, having to pay $250+ a month is quite expensive for people.

And to all the people who will ultimately belittle my ‘expensive’ comment with comments about Civic parking blah blah blah $10 per day blah blah blah, please don’t as it doesn’t add value to Barton parking does it?

m@ said :

c_c said :

m@ said :

Probably has more to do with the loss of parking spaces around the Barton/Forrest area to new office buildings…

I’m not buying that. I though a lot of the new office buildings had underground parking that at least equalled in capacity the parking lost by their construction. If any don’t, then the NCA royally screwed up their planning approvals.

Just off the top of my head, there were 100-odd unofficial spaces along State Circle, probably another 30-40 lost in the Windsor Walk mudpit. 20 or 30 along Gipps St are now in a three-hour zone. Then there are the open-air carparks between DBCDE and Minter Ellison (building site) and Minter Ellison and Canberra Ave (future building site) – probably 300+ in total. Pretty sure I’m not imagining any of that 😉

Even if the new buildings have an equal number of spaces to the block that was there before (they won’t), there’s still increased competition for parking because this ‘new’ parking is taken up by the people working in the new building. The people who work in other buildings still have to park somewhere.

The NCA hasn’t failed to plan for this so much as they don’t seem to understand that a hypothetical multi-storey carpark in three years’ time doesn’t help people who can’t find a parking space today.

banco said :

c_c said :

m@ said :

Probably has more to do with the loss of parking spaces around the Barton/Forrest area to new office buildings…

I’m not buying that. I though a lot of the new office buildings had underground parking that at least equalled in capacity the parking lost by their construction. If any don’t, then the NCA royally screwed up their planning approvals.

There’s been a quite deliberate policy of reducing the number of parks in Barton to try to force more people on to the crappy bus system.

The parliamentary triangle is one of the easiest and most convenient places to get to by bus.
I’m even happy to catch a bus there just for a meeting.

Blaming the bus system for your own personal laziness is pathetic. Walking that extra kilometre per day to and from bus stops might help your mental state as well as your waistline

I’ve met a few people who parked (for free) in and around the Parli triangle and then biked/scooted/skated into Civic. In at least one case it would certainly have been considerably quicker for them to cycle directly to work from their home (admittedly they may well no longer do this as parking is now much more difficult).

They have always driven to work. Finding carparks becomes harder, they are further away, more expensive, but they do not rethink the original assumption that they always drive their car.

It can be challenging to change well established habits/thought patterns.