1 August 2013

Morrison pledges to overhaul Wellington city’s traffic policing culture

Mayoral candidate John Morrison has come out in support of southern ward councillor Paul Eagle’s concerns that Wellington City is ignoring motorists and city users by “stripping people of money and pretending its customer service.”

The council’s contract with privately owned Australian company Tenix and Parkwise, a division of Armourguard, is under review, which Mr Morrison said presented a perfect opportunity to overhaul the present set-up.

“We’ve got a green mayor who wants to make life as difficult as possible for motorists coming into the city and we’ve got an overzealous private army of traffic wardens combing the city and suburbs with their automatic instant fine machines at the ready.

“Wellington’s parking makes the city very children-unfriendly. It’s much easier and safer for shoppers to drive to a mall in Porirua, Lower Hutt or Coastlands, get a free park and shop for as long as they like. The internet is slaying bricks and mortar retailers and the council’s revenue-gathering policy is keeping people away from Wellington’s CBD shops in droves.

“Our cornerstone CBD retailers are withering and if they fail it will become harder to levy rates. If this scenario is played out the traffic ticket revenue would be peanuts compared to the multi-millions of lost rates because the CBD shops are empty.

“We’ve got to remember that we are elected to look after the best interests of Wellingtonians and the present parking police culture contradicts this mandate.”

Mr Morrison said the original intent of parking control was to ensure car parks were available for shoppers and not hogged by all-day workers.

“You only have to mention parking and just about everyone’s got a war story that’s made them angry and upset because they feel they have been treated harshly and unfairly,” Mr Morrison said.

“If I become Mayor I will change the system and the culture of the parking police. I will be looking at technology as a means of delivering on this promise. Wellington needs a balanced public-private transport system, which at the moment it is missing.”

ends

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