For former Hinemoa St business owner Crystal McPhee, the impact of the new system was felt almost immediately.<\/p>\n
McPhee recently relocated her The Mum Collections shop to Lake Rd, on the fringes of the city centre, after what she described as a dramatic drop in trade after the introduction of the new regime.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just feel like there wasn\u2019t enough conversation happening around what the parking was and what was going to go down for the Rotorua community,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
McPhee said her business went from making over $1000 a day \u201dto literally nothing”. Some days she made money, perhaps $200 or $300, \u201cbut we just went dead for weeks\u201d.<\/p>\n
McPhee stopped short of blaming the parking system alone, but said she believed the way the changes were introduced left many people frustrated and reluctant to visit the city centre.<\/p>\n
\u201cI feel like it did have a big impact on the businesses,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
The Mum Collections shop on Hinemoa St in Rotorua before it moved after city centre parking changes.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s become a ghost town again; the town is dead.\u201d<\/p>\n
Another Hinemoa St retailer, Rahul Sethi, said he was ready to follow McPhee out of the inner-city.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe minute I get a chance, I will just move from here,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Sethi said trade across his two businesses had dropped by 30-35% since the parking changes came into effect and other businesses in the area were \u201cdefinitely losing money\u201d too.<\/p>\n
Sethi said customers regularly told him they avoided the city centre during the day, while some elderly shoppers found the system confusing.<\/p>\n
He recalled one who left rather than navigate the registration process.<\/p>\n
Sethi said he understood the need to manage parking demand, but believed the system was discouraging people from visiting central Rotorua.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t blame the council when it says every customer deserves a park, of course, I believe that,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Rotorua business owner Rahul Sethi is not happy with the new city parking system. Photo \/ Mathew Nash<\/p>\n
\u201cBut charging for something that was free before, and asking for you to register within 10 minutes for free parking, it\u2019s too much.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s not a solution; it is a punishment.\u201d<\/p>\n
The parking overhaul followed a review of the city\u2019s parking policy, bylaw and inner-city parking management arrangements last year. <\/p>\n
Korean Mart owner James Kim said he had also experienced slower trading. <\/p>\n
\u201cOur sales have maybe dropped about 20%,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Kim said broader economic conditions could also be playing a role.<\/p>\n
\u201cI can\u2019t really blame parking for everything, but I\u2019m pretty sure that it plays some role in this.\u201d<\/p>\n
Korean Mart owner James Kim. Photo \/ Mathew Nash<\/p>\n
The council\u2019s parking survey closes on September 20 and will feed into a six-month review of the new system. <\/p>\n
Council destination development manager Jean-Paul Gaston said feedback on the new parking system had been \u201cmixed\u201d.<\/p>\n
Some had \u201cshared positive experiences\u201d and others were \u201ctaking time to understand and adapt\u201d, he said.<\/p>\n
Gaston said survey feedback would help find what is working well and what \u201cadjustments might be needed\u201d, as it will provide a baseline for the full review.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve always said that this is a starting point and once there had been enough time for the community to get familiar with the new system we would be open to considering appropriate improvements,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
He said the parking changes were \u201cwidely promoted\u201d before July, with more than 1000 booklets delivered to businesses, social media posts viewed more than 120,000 times and more than 900 people signing up early for permits.<\/p>\n
He said the council had not heard from any specific business about parking changes leading to a decision to close, but it recognised \u201cthe pressures many businesses and wh\u0101nau\u201d face in the current economic climate. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe are listening carefully to feedback from residents, businesses and the wider community,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
Rotorua Business Chamber chief executive Mel Short encouraged businesses and residents to take part in the survey.<\/p>\n
Rotorua Business Chamber chief executive Melanie Short. Photo \/ NZME<\/p>\n
\u201cThe six-month review is very important and, at that time, we will take and use feedback from our business community and make an appropriate submission.\u201d<\/p>\n
Short said it was important people shared their experiences so the council could consider whether changes were needed after the system had time to bed in.<\/p>\n
Mathew Nash is a Local Democracy Reporting journalist based at the Rotorua Daily Post. He has previously written for SunLive, been a regular contributor to RNZ and was a football reporter in the UK for eight years.<\/p>\n
\u2013 LDR is local body journalism co-funded by RNZ and NZ On Air.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For former Hinemoa St business owner Crystal McPhee, the impact of the new system was felt almost immediately.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":599958,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[6127,9526,806,4995,52688,138,10166,1550,2199,10039,5205,4381,4189,14046,702,101,19133,111,139,69,90,3111,5256,30205,659,1327,5659,312,27950,8229,584,21539],"class_list":["post-599957","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-already","tag-another","tag-as","tag-away","tag-blaming","tag-business","tag-businesses","tag-centre","tag-city","tag-controversial","tag-council","tag-customers","tag-driving","tag-hurt","tag-it","tag-left","tag-looking","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-on","tag-out","tag-overhaul","tag-parking","tag-retailer","tag-rotorua","tag-say","tag-says","tag-seeks","tag-they","tag-trade","tag-views"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/599957","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=599957"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/599957\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/599958"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=599957"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=599957"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=599957"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}