Almost €600,000 in parking fines collected by Galway City Council

Almost €600,000 in parking fines was collected by Galway City Council last year – just 10% less than pre-pandemic figures, despite a chunk of the year having been spent in lockdown.

According to local councillor, Níall McNelis, this showed a worrying disregard for parking regulations and greater enforcement was required to reduce the problem.

It was particularly concerning, he said, as the focus of wardens had been on serious breaches while the highest level of Covid restrictions were in place – namely parking on double yellow lines; impeding a clearway; or parking in disabled parking bays.

“111 of those were for parking in a disability bay [for which there is a €150 fine]. Overall, there were 16,291 tickets issued – 1,668 appeals were lodged and 707 of those were successful.

In 2019, almost 19,500 fines were issued, amounting to €658,000; that figure dropped to just 15,540 in 2020, during the worst of the Covid restrictions, with €564,000 collected by the Council.

Cllr McNelis said the objective was not to gather money from fines but rather to deter illegal parking – and with fines for illegal parking increased from €40 to €80, he said that should act as a deterrent.

“We can see there is a gradual increase happening again, as we come out of Covid restrictions.

“The fines for parking on a footpath, in a cycle lane or a bus lane must be enforced and people should remember that the Council has a contractor in place to remove a vehicle if it is causing an obstruction.

“We have to encourage people to use long-term parking spaces, be it in the private multi-storey carparks or in the Council-owned ones at the Cathedral, Dyke Road and Mill Street,” he said, conceding that the recent increase in cost for parking at Council-owned facilities could have an impact.

The Council needed to push ahead with the introduction of a monthly ticket without delay, he added.

There were nine community wardens operating in the city, continued Cllr McNelis, and Gardaí also had a role to play in ensuring illegal parking was curtailed.

“We need to embrace technology and there should be an option to pay by text, similar to what you have in some of the private car parks,” he said.

Cllr McNelis said there were 1,100 residents’ parking permits issued in the city – with up to four available for each household at a cost of €30 per permit. This took up a significant proportion of on-street parking in the city.