Parking fees set to rise this year

Dublin City Council  are increasing the cost of parking throughout the city centre in an attempt to lower the number of people driving into the city centre and encourage drivers to switch to public transport.

The higher prices are due to come into effect in July.

The Liberties area spans across both the yellow and red zones. The yellow zone referring to areas of “very high demand” and the red zone referring to areas of “high demand”

It is being proposed to increase charges in the yellow zone to €3.20 an hour and in the red zone to €2.70 an hour. If motorists use the ‘Parking Tag’ app, they will only be charged €3.10 to park in a yellow zone and €2.60 to park in a red zone.

The Liberty went out to St Patrick’s Park to see what the reaction to the rising fees would be.

Tara Brazil feels like rising the parking fees wouldn’t benefit anyone. Ms Brazil said, “People have so much to pay for, like food, clothes and supporting their families.

“Parking shouldn’t be something that they are worrying about and shouldn’t be another added extra cost into their daily lives.”

Chloe Corcoran also thinks that people have to choose between “spending loads of money on the car or loads of money on public transport”.

Ms Corcoran said, “There’s no middle ground for it. A lot of students living around this area  can’t afford to get cars, and then when they can finally afford to get a car they up the prices.” However, she does think that “there are better ways to sort out the problem then just raising the prices”.

Although it’s an extra cost for people to worry about, Ms Brazil does think that “raising the price could fix the problem of people parking their cars and then just going off to work for the day” and would encourage people to use public transport more.

There are further plans to introduce a charge for coach parking in the city in designated coaching parking bays.

As well as this, the amendment is planning to lower the permit quota to one permit per premises. It is also being proposed to widen certain boundaries of the green, red, and yellow zones.

If you wish to send a submission about the changes to the Parking Control Bye-Laws you can make a submission online at https://consultation.dublincity.ie before 4pm on Friday the 22nd of March 2019.