Perth commuters using the Queens Gardens car parks in East Perth will have until October to enjoy free parking before the space is levelled to make way for the East Perth Primary School.
Premier Roger Cook clarified the date of the car park’s closure after a confusing press conference at the site on Tuesday morning where Education Minister Tony Buti initially suggested the entire car park would be closed by the end of this week.
Perth MP and Housing Minister John Carey, Premier Roger Cook and Education Minister Tony Buti at the site of the new East Perth Primary School on Monday.Credit: Hamish Hastie
Cook and Buti announced forward works would begin within days on the $165 million high-rise primary school, but asked when access to the 500 bays east of Horatio Street would be closed he said before Friday.
“It will start this week, signage will be up and there are other car parks. It’s not unusual for car parks to be closed at any particular time, and there are other vacant car parks,” he said.
When pressed over that timeline and whether commuters had enough warning of the car park closure, Buti said the primary school had been thoroughly discussed in the media for more than a year.
Cook then clarified the car park was not closing by the end of this week and that it would mostly remain open while forward works were underway.
“While we are doing preliminary site works, this car park will continue to be made available to the WA public, and for the foreseeable future,” he said.
“The vast majority of this site will be available until October, we will be doing early site works relocating power supply for power services, and things like that, but parking will continue to be free here for the foreseeable future.”
The car park is surrounded by signage mentioning it is the planned site of the new primary school, but there is no mention of when the car park will close.
Queens Gardens car park will be the site of the new East Perth Primary School.Credit: Hamish Hastie
The 497-bay Queens Gardens car park has been the site of an ongoing row between the state government and City of Perth with Lord Mayor and Liberal candidate for Churchlands Basil Zempilas furious that the government pushed through legislation to acquire the site from the city.
Late last year Zempilas took aim at the state government for rejecting a proposal for the city to run the car park on behalf of the state.
The bays are currently being offered for free to commuters, but Zempilas had previously claimed they would have generated $650,000 in parking levies, and that the total cost of the move could be as much as $1 million.
Zempilas said the city was set to lose 1000 car bays with the Queens Gardens car park closure coupled with the closure of the concert hall car park and the Terrace Road car park eventually closing to make way for the Aboriginal Cultural Centre.
“The question of access to our city for visitors and workers and where they will park into the future is becoming a real issue which will require careful forward planning,” he said.
“Based on the premier and education minster’s press conference earlier today no one can have any confidence this government have got a plan to help manage the future parking requirements in and around our city – they don’t even know what’s happening next week.”
The contract for the design of East Perth Primary School has been awarded to WA firm Edgar Idle Wade in a joint venture agreement with ARM Architecture.
The school will open its doors for the 2029 school year with a capacity of 600 students.
It is expected it would ease pressure on Highgate Primary school.
“It will revitalise the city will allow residents to have a school that they will send their children to,” Buti said.
“It will be so important for the future development of the City of Perth, it will be a state-of-the-art school that will not only have first-class education facilities but will be open to the community after hours.”
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