Parking fine drop

Andrew Mathieson
NEW parking meters are robbing council’s coffers from hundreds of thousands of dollars in parking fines annually.
The move two years ago to introduce the state-of-the-art machines forced City officers to review projected revenue for this financial year.
Council had already estimated a drop from $4.37 million in 2009/2010 to $3.9 million after parking officers issued more than 1000 fewer notices.
But the latest projections were “now considered unlikely to exceed $3.3 million”.
The figure would be the lowest from city infringements since 2002. Fines had averaged a rise of $375,000 over the past decade.
The City’s health and local laws acting manager Shane Scriggins said the change of machines resulted in “much improved” compliance rates.
“We have had good feedback from motorists since the introduction of the new parking machines,” he said.
Mr Scriggins said transferable tickets along with credit card payments at the new machines had reduced parking fines.
Council still collected more than $4 million – or $12,897 a day – in parking infringements last year.
Revenue rose steadily from $1.54 million in 2002/03 to $2.29 million in 2005/06, reaching $3.8 million by 2008/09.
Mr Scriggins said revenue projections from paid parking were forecast to be almost $8 million this year, including $6,828,135 from on-street parking, a rise of more than $1 million.