Dubai residents say doubling paid parking prices will not motivate them to use public transport

RTA says prices will double in some areas, in a move designed to help solve problem of high demand and to get people onto public transport.

The Roads and Transport Authority has doubled parking fees in some areas of the city in an attempt to get more people to use public transport. Sarah Dea / The National

DUBAI // The Roads and Transport Authority has doubled parking fees in some areas of the city in an attempt to get more people to use public transport.

Executive Council resolution No 5 of 2016 on public parking services in Dubai detailed the changes that the RTA’s director general, Mattar Al Tayer, said would streamline paid parking management, help to solve the problem of high demand for parking spaces and encourage people to use public transport.

The change will affect 30,000 spaces – about 23 per cent of the 130,000 paid parking spaces in Dubai.

The new tariff rates for parking on the street will increase from Dh2 for one hour and Dh5 for two, to Dh2 for 30 minutes, Dh4 for one hour and Dh8 for two hours, rising proportionately to Dh11 for four hours.

The new tariffs apply for 14 hours each day.

The rates for car parks, which were previously rated the same as street parking, are Dh3 for one hour, up from Dh2, and Dh6 for two hours, up from Dh4, increasing to Dh20 for 24 hours.

The tariffs apply from 8am to 10pm on working days, but, as previously, do not apply on Fridays and public holidays.

Residents said they did not believe that doubling the parking fee would get more people on to public transport.

Drivers and commuters were sceptical about the changes.

Filipino retail worker Michael Lopez commutes from Satwa to Tecom on metro every day.

“It’s already so busy. More people using it is going to be very difficult,” he said. “Unless they put on more trains, I don’t see how this helps.”

Freelance personal trainer Hannah Logan drives around the city all day for work, travelling to clients. For her, raising parking fees definitely does not sway her towards using public transport.

“It doesn’t encourage me to use the metro, as most of the places I go to, I can’t reach by metro anyway and I definitely don’t have time to take long-distance buses,” she said.

Nazia Ali, a mother of two, said public transport was not an option.

“We live in Tecom and, as it is, walking isn’t always easy. Often there is no pavement or is very hard to navigate, with potholes and steep rises and slopes, so getting to the metro station itself is difficult, even though it’s not that far away,” she said.