$5.6m cash splash to fix city’s parking pain

Councillors will vote on the fate of a sweeping action plan at a council meeting on Wednesday evening.

The 330-page proposed document breaks the city up into 110 separate parking precincts with estimated costs for works in each sector hitting up to $520,000.

Among the most costly, included improvements to the city’s health and education precinct bounded by Victoria and Wendouree Parades and Webster Street and Drummond Street North. 

A traffic count of the precinct revealed at peak times parking on all streets within the precinct was below 80 per cent of capacity.

Under the plan, the council proposed to increase the parking capacity of Webster Street through paving and line marking of the roadside.

The report also outlined the potential to implement revolutionary parking technology such as Parking Overstay Detection Systems when undertaking road upgrades.

The report also canvassed ideas including encouraging people to cycle instead of driving by installing informal cycling lanes and more bike parking.  

Ballarat council’s director of infrastructure and environment Terry Demeo said stages of the multi-million dollar project would be funded over ten years. 

“Implementation of actions within the plan will be considered in the budget process of each year,” Mr Demeo said.

He said there were no plans to recoup the costs through enforcement and infringements.

He also said the council had not yet determined which precincts would be the top priority.  

“This will be determined once the council has considered the action plan,” he said.

He said the council’s parking plan had been in the pipeline for years and officers had sought inspiration and advice from parking technologies across the globe.   

“As part of developing the action plan, extensive research was undertaken to benchmark Ballarat’s parking with other Victorian and Australian municipalities,” Mr Demeo said.

“We also investigated parking technologies in use around the world.”

More than 4000 extra car parks are set to be built under the ambitious plan.

There are also plans to increased enforcement, restriction upgrades, rationalisation of loading zones, transferable tickets, parking permits, mobile phone pay for parking fees, changes to public transport, increased bike lanes and new parking stations are all part of the review designed to alleviate parking congestion and renew life in the CBD.