{"id":395261,"date":"2026-09-09T23:24:15","date_gmt":"2026-09-09T23:24:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/395261\/"},"modified":"2026-09-09T23:24:15","modified_gmt":"2026-09-09T23:24:15","slug":"florida-beach-visitors-frustrated-with-price-of-parking","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/395261\/","title":{"rendered":"Florida beach visitors frustrated with price of parking"},"content":{"rendered":"

PINELLAS COUNTY, Fla. (WFTS) \u2014 As summer comes to an end, people who visit our beaches say they are getting fed up with the high prices to park.<\/p>\n

“Woah\u2026 $10.55 for two hours? Yeah, it\u2019s pretty expensive\u2026 but that\u2019s what you have to pay nowadays, I guess,” said Dawn Smith, who is visiting Treasure Island.<\/p>\n

When it comes to visiting our beautiful beaches, people now have to pay a lot more than they expect.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe current prices seem to be pretty high, and I understand there\u2019s been inflation and so forth. But for families and kids, five or six dollars an hour seems kind of high,\u201d Tim Armstrong said.<\/p>\n

This summer we\u2019ve seen some of the highest parking prices along the coast compared to previous years, with hourly rates reaching $5 to $6.<\/p>\n

\u201cI mean, it\u2019s not great. I know everything else is getting expensive… you kind of roll with it. But yeah, it definitely used to be cheaper to park here. Over the years, we\u2019ve seen it go up,\u201d Michael Padron said.<\/p>\n

Tim Armstrong remembers when a trip to the beach was affordable a decade ago.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou know, it was probably a dollar, a dollar fifty an hour back in that time frame,\u201d Armstrong said.<\/p>\n

Now people have to plan ahead.<\/p>\n

\u201cPlan the day \u2014 how long you\u2019re going to stay, how much you\u2019re going to spend on parking and the cost of food,\u201d Smith said.<\/p>\n

Some have recently avoided beaches with high parking rates.<\/p>\n

\u201cSometimes I will go to Honeymoon Beach, where you just pay seven bucks for the day. You can be there all day, parked for seven bucks, so it saves money,\u201d Andrea Guerrero said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe economy, everything is so high. Yeah, definitely, you try to find the most cost-effective beach you can go to,\u201d Smith said.<\/p>\n

People hope parking rates don\u2019t go up any more, but say a day of fun is worth it.<\/p>\n

“When we come to St. Pete, we always come to this spot. So I’m okay paying for the day here,” said Guerrero.<\/p>\n

“If you want to live the life, you got to pay the price,” said Smith.<\/p>\n

Share Your Story with Casey

Casey Albritton is dedicated to telling your stories throughout South Pinellas County. From St. Petersburg to Largo, she\u2019s there to share the triumphs and struggles of the community she calls home. So, let Casey know about the stories that matter to you.
.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Is the beach public or private property? Hotel owner goes head-to-head with City of St. Pete Beach in lawsuit<\/p>\n

The battle over a beach is now headed to federal court. St. Pete Beach is going head-to-head with a local hotel owner over the issue of who owns the sand.<\/p>\n

Is the beach public or private property? Hotel owner goes head-to-head with City of St. Pete Beach in lawsuit<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PINELLAS COUNTY, Fla. (WFTS) \u2014 As summer comes to an end, people who visit our beaches say they…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":395262,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[513,22653,12931,596,107032,14161,202,2149,204,203,199,201,200,5910,3670,2151],"class_list":["post-395261","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-st-petersburg","tag-beach","tag-fees","tag-parking","tag-pinellas-county","tag-pinellas-news","tag-price","tag-st-pete","tag-st-pete-beach","tag-st-pete-headlines","tag-st-pete-news","tag-st-petersburg","tag-st-petersburg-headlines","tag-st-petersburg-news","tag-tampa-bay-28","tag-tampa-bay-local-news","tag-treasure-island"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395261","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=395261"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395261\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/395262"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=395261"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=395261"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=395261"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}