Seniors Club gets parking reprieve

MEMBERS of the Ballarat Senior Citizens Club will see the return of their parking permit system following an announcement by the City of Ballarat.

Seventeen free carparks will be allocated to the club under a permit system with the spaces made available in the Little Bridge Street off street park.

They will be available to members between 9am and 3.30pm and the permits will be limited to a specific vehicle registration and will not be transferrable.

“After reviewing the concerns of the club we felt the return of some free parking was warranted to allow people to be able to access the activities on offer at the Ballarat Senior Citizens Club,” said City of Ballarat mayor Cr Ben Taylor.

“The Smarter Parking Plan will constantly be reviewed and if we think there are specific areas of concern we will address it, as we have with the Senior Citizens Club.”

Cr Taylor also took the opportunity to reject claims circulating online that it was possible for people to end other users parking sessions via the new city’s new parking meters.

“The parking meters do not have the technology to allow people to end other people’s parking sessions. They can’t even end their own sessions, the time just runs out,” he said.

With the new parking plan five days old, council has revealed early numbers on its usage.

In the first three days of operation 4554 people claimed a free hour of parking, 675 people had paid using the coin machines and 1854 motorists used the credit card facilities.

Uptake of the CellOPark app has also been strong with 5719 people downloading software since the system went live on Monday.

The municipality expected all 143 parking meters and machines to be fully operational by 15 February.