Bruce Bishop car park rates hiked: Residents react with astonishment

Council has been slammed for dramatically hiking costs at a controversial Surfers Paradise car park despite more than half of spaces being left empty on most days of the week. Have your say - vote in our poll.

Residents have reacted with astonishment to news that fees are being hiked at a Surfers Paradise car park that sits half empty for most of the week.

From July 1 monthly fees to park at the Bruce Bishop car park in Surfers Paradise will almost triple, from $131 to $350, while the weekly rate will rise from $52 to $95.

The rise in short-term rates is less dramatic. A stay of between two and three hours will cost $14 as opposed to $9.90 previously, while the maximum daily rate lifts from $16 to $19.

Bruce Bishop car park in Surfers Paradise.

The changes come despite a Bulletin report last month revealing the car park was the worst performing on the Gold Coast, with only one fifth of spaces in use on most weekdays.

Cr Darren Taylor said at the time that the car park dropped to five levels, but many motorists were not aware of that. “So how do we encourage people to use the lower parts of the basement,” he said.

The price rise has been met with astonishment by residents, who said the car park was used by people working in local businesses.

“This monthly parking is used for anyone that works in the area. Small business and employees can’t afford this. Criminal,” one person said on the Surfers Paradise community page.

“Surfers Paradise businesses really suffer because of lack of affordable parking,” another person commented. “I didn’t know there’s so many spaces underneath the car park. I thought it was just a small car park. A bit of common sense could bring Surfers back if they lowered the prices and used basic economics.”

The sentiment was shared by another commentator, who said: “This will again sadly shut down small businesses as people can’t afford to park and as good as the tram line is it only helps ones who live close to it.”

Another said simply: “That’s crazy”.

A council spokesperson said the changes would bring fees at the car park more into line with other nearby facilities.

“As part of budget considerations, extensive benchmarking was undertaken that compared prices at the Bruce Bishop Carpark with nearby facilities with similar characteristics. The new fees are still lower than those car parks but are more in line with market value,” the spokesperson said.

“Monthly, quarterly, 6-monthly and annual passes are available and offer considerable discounts on daily prices.”

Council has considered selling the ageing car park on a number of occasions.

However in October last year a $50 million offer for the troubled facility by a private consortium called Finding Other Solutions was rejected.

It was also revealed late last year that ratepayers face a bill of up to $50m to repair the crumbling facility, which is affected by concrete cancer.