In response to pressure from the Property Council, Transport Minister Steve Bredhauer has finally agreed to rule out a CBD parking tax in the next term, should Labor be re-elected.
The Coalition have similarly ruled out a parking tax.
The Property Council wrote to Minister Breadhauer in mid 2000, urging the Government to distance itself from Department of Transport and City Council recommendations for "hard travel demand management" measures - the euphemism for parking taxes.
We knew the Department of Transport favoured the use of things like parking taxes to increase the price of car parking and hopefully force commuters to use public transport.
Back then, the Minister refused to rule it out saying that "all options are being considered."
Last week, the Property Council publicly renewed its call to abolish such a scheme, prompting the Minister's office to rule out a parking tax.
This is good news as parking taxes do nothing to solve transport congestion, and only end up penalising small businesses and commuters who don't have convenient access to public transport.
However, the Property Council is concerned that the win may be short lived - a recent advertisement seeking candidates for a “Travel Demand Management Manager” seems to indicate increased policy attention to the demand side.
TDM is becoming a euphemism for pricing measures to discourage private commuters in favour of public transport.
The Property Council will continue to promote better supply side policies for public and private transport infrastructure, before demand measures are use to penalise commuters and businesses.
