Free parking for hospital staff; changes to parking enforcement
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Published on 26 March 2020
The City of Hobart will make free parking available for identified hospital staff nominated by their employer.
Lord Mayor Anna Reynolds said free parking would be offered in the Argyle Street multi-storey car park to a number of identified Royal Hobart Hospital and Hobart Private Hospital.
“This is one way we can make things a little easier for those wonderful people in our community who are looking after our health at this important time,” Cr Reynolds said.
“We’re also looking at whether there are other areas that can support free parking for health workers and we’ll provide further information as it becomes available.”
Nominated frontline hospital staff, whose names will be provided to car park staff, will be able to gain free parking by presenting their employee identification at the ground floor cashier’s office.
Currently, the carpark operates between 7 am and 10 pm. Arrangements are being made to introduce 24-hour parking at the facility.
General Manager Nick Heath said the City would scale down its parking enforcement activities, although matters of safety would continue to be enforced.
“With lower demand on parking, we are able to ease time limits on some regulated parking,” Mr Heath said.
From tomorrow, in areas where the signposted time limit is one or two hours, motorists can park for up to twice the signposted limit without incurring a penalty – provided they have parked safely and not causing a hazard to other motorists.
“Fines will continue to be issued for unsafe parking practices and legislated regulations such as disability parking, parking over yellow lines, clearways, bus zones and in front of driveways,” Mr Heath said.
“In addition, our officers will continue to follow up parking complaints that are logged with the City.”
Short-term parking areas with time limits of 5, 10, 15 or 30 minutes will continue to be enforced in the interest of supporting express food takeaways and retail pick-ups.
Additional 15-minute parking will be implemented in dining precincts such as North Hobart and Salamanca Place to further support access to takeaway food services.
More information on this will be available in the coming days.
PARKING CHANGES SUMMARY:
Nominated hospital staff working with COVID-19 patients to gain free parking at Argyle St car park during operating hours upon presentation of staff ID. In parking zones with signposted time limits of one or two hours, motorists may park for up to twice the signposted time limit without penalty. Shorter-term parking areas (5, 10, 15 or 30 minutes) will be enforced to encourage turnover to support food and retail businesses. Additional short-term parking to be installed at key dining precincts to support takeaway food sales. Legislated parking rules and matters of safety will be enforced. Parking complaints will continue to be investigated with appropriate follow-up.