‘We’ve got a winner’: Charging for Hagley car parks sees more parks for visitors

Saturday, 5 April 2025

Visitor numbers to the Botanic Gardens in Christchurch have not suffered, despite far fewer people using the car parks than expected.

The city council’s move to monetise car parks around Hagley Park has not been as profitable as expected, but it has appeared to solve the mooching problem.

The Christchurch City Council is making less than half the revenue it hoped to by introducing fees to 620 car parks around the gardens.

While a much emptier car park could indicate fewer people are visiting the gardens, figures provided to The Press show that is not the case, and people who use the grounds say they have stopped seeing people taking advantage by parking their cars there just to walk into town.

The council installed parking meters in late November and have only earned an average of 46% of the forecast weekly revenue.

“I think we’ve got a winner,” mayor Phil Mauger said.

In June 2024, the city council agreed to monetise the then-free car parks around Hagley Park and the Botanic Gardens. It followed concerns that CBD shoppers and workers were taking advantage, but some feared the cost would stop people from going to the gardens.

The council installed parking meters in late November and expected to earn $38,700 a week on average - based on an assumed occupancy rate of 80% - but has managed only about 46% of the forecast. Users paid $2 for the first hour, and a maximum of $4.60 for three hours.

There is now more turnover in the car park and visitors coming for meetings can actually get a spot, according to Mike Harvey, who works from the Hadlee Sports Centre.

Regardless, the number of visitors to the gardens has stayed about the same in the last three months compared to the year prior, according to the council’s pedestrian visitor counters.

There were 10,000 more pedestrians visitors counted in January - for a total of 94,153 visitors - compared to the year prior. A drop of 14,000 pedestrians entering in March could be due to renovation work around the museum, the council said.

From his Hadlee Sports Centre office, Mike Harvey, general manager of Christchurch Metro Cricket Association, said he and his colleagues used to watch people use the free car parks only to wander into the city.

Council head of parks Rupert Bool says the council has worked with people using the park to support their needs.

“People were worried about it at the start but it seems to be no problem. People are just kind of getting on with it.”

There was now more turnover in the car park and visitors coming for meetings could get a spot, he said.

Although his organisation had been concerned about games being disrupted by key people needing to move their cars, the council agreed to give free parking to match officials, scorers, coaches and others from the organisation.

Free parking had not been extended to participants, he said, but he was pleased with what the organisation could get.

Rupert Bool, the council’s head of parks, said the council had worked with sports organisations and stakeholders throughout the park to support their needs.

He said the council had forecast making $1.6 million a year from monetising the car parks. That annual target would not be met largely due to a five month delay in installing parking meters, but now it was operational, the weekly average was less than half than expected.

But Mauger said even $800,000 a year in revenue the council otherwise would not have was great news.

“If it’s (paid parking) stopped people having free parking there all day and sort of ruining it for everyone else, I think we’ve got a winner,” he said.