Let’s Talk about Parking

Here is how Council proposes to meet and manage car parking demand out to 2040 in Rangiora and Kaiapoi town centres.

Why we need to plan for town centre parking

The District is expected to have 20,000 new residents by 2040 with an estimated population of 90,000! The Council must plan for this growth; this includes looking after the vibrancy and functionality of our town centres.

Having enough (and the right type of) parking is important in making town centres successful and economically resilient, and meeting the needs of our community, including those with special purposes or requirements, such as our low mobility users.

To make sure parking meets the needs of the centres and visitors today, tomorrow and in the future, the Council is developing a Parking Management Plan for Rangiora and Kaiapoi town centres (plans for other District towns will be developed later).

After listening to ideas and feedback from the community, stakeholders and local businesses, and undertaking technical investigations, we've come up with a proposed staged approach for meeting and managing parking demand out to 2040.

We now want to hear what our community thinks of this.

Parking trends and projections

Our goal

We want to aim for a target parking occupancy of 70% to 85%. In real terms, this means that at peak times, on average nearly one in every three (at 70% occupancy) to one in every seven or so (at 85% occupancy) parks will be available to park in.

Current

We have done surveys that show that both of our town centres can cope with the current parking demand. While some areas are busier than others, generally, there are enough nearby areas within a short walking distance with plenty of parking available for shoppers, visitors and all-day parkers.

Future

We've developed parking models for Rangiora and Kaiapoi town centres that show us the predicted stress on parking areas out to the year 2040.

To get realistic future projections, we've inputted projected population growth and key changes in land use that we are expecting to see, and when. This allows us to get a good sense of the impact growth has on parking demand, and how much parking will be available in the future across different areas in the town centres.

Our model for Kaiapoi shows that by 2040, there is actually still ample parking available.

In Rangiora however, we will need up to 100 more car parks by 2035, and a further 100 after that by 2040 to stay within our desired target parking occupancy range.

Tools for managing and meeting parking demands

There are lots of different tools for managing and meeting parking demands. These range from things like better signage to direct drivers to parking areas, improving and/or extending the time restrictions, building more carparks, charging for parking, introducing graduated priced parking (where the first hour or two is free with charges applied for longer stays), and better monitoring and enforcement. These sorts of tools generally fit into three key strategic responses:

• Optimise existing assets (e.g. make best use of what we already have)
• Manage demand (e.g. paid parking)
• Increase supply (e.g. build more carparks)

We've considered these, and have come up with a proposed staged approach for each centre that we think strikes the right balance between these three strategic responses.

A proposed staged approach to managing and meeting parking demand out to 2040

The future demand for parking is different in the two town centres, and so our proposed approach for each centres is different.

Both town centres could see some gains made from making best use of existing parks. However, on its own, this won’t be sufficient to keep up with growth in Rangiora. Therefore Rangiora town centre will require additional measures to manage parking, and to add more parking supply. Our proposed staged approach for consultation is as follows:

Key inputs into developing a Parking Management Plan for Rangiora & Kaiapoi town centres

Several key project inputs go into developing a Parking Management Plan for Rangiora and Kaiapoi town centres, including a review of the wider strategic context and undertaking important technical investigations. The latter has included administering parking surveys, developing parking models, reviewing parking related data and considering different parking tools and scenarios.

To date, we’ve undertaken considerable early engagement to better understand parking demand and pressures. This has included reviewing previous consultation feedback related to parking, undertaking surveys of businesses and town centre visitors, holding evening meetings with town centre business representatives, and running an Inquiry by Design workshop with stakeholders.

We now want to hear what the wider community thinks about our proposed approaches. We will then consider the feedback we get, before we formulate a Parking Management Plan. Any new budget required to implement actions identified in a final Parking Management Plan will be sought through a future Annual Plan / Long Term Plan process, on which the community has the opportunity to comment.

Council is also reviewing our Parking Bylaw to ensure rules and regulations in place work for residents today and in the immediate future. We will be going out for engagement/public comment on the Parking Bylaw around mid-year.