TOWN Clerk Royston King has rubbished claims by some sections of society that the Mayor and City Council (M&CC) is holding on to the parking meter contract with Smart City Solutions (SCS) because it is fearful of the implications of terminating the contract.
On the sidelines of a meeting with mechanical workshop operators at City Hall, King told this newspaper that the M&CC does not envision scrapping the contract.

“We have a contract that is in force. We couldn’t just abandon or stop the contract; there are legal implications. But the M&CC is not scared to terminate the contract. We have deliberately and properly signed a contract with our partner, SCS, and that contract is in force. We couldn’t scrap the contract like that,” he expressed.
The Town Clerk said the M&CC had wide consultations with various stakeholders and have adjusted the price structure as a result.
“We understand they had a concern with the price structure, we adjusted it and we are waiting on a revision of the by-laws. We’ve paid attention to the concerns of our stakeholders and of our citizens,” he said.

Meanwhile, the M&CC recently announced slight adjustments to the rates and implementation structure of the metered parking project.
Both Mayor Patricia Chase-Green and King had earlier indicated in the news that the cost for parking will be cut in half, evidently meaning that the cost to park per hour would have been dropped from $200 an hour plus VAT, to $100 an hour plus VAT.
But it was announced afterwards that the slashing in half is meant to benefit only those who are parking for eight hours or more. Thus, the cost per hour remains at $200 plus VAT. And any motorist paying for four hours of metered parking will automatically be credited with eight hours of metered parking.

Furthermore, rather than paying for a particular space for a particular amount of time, motorists will instead be paying for parking time for their particular cars. This essentially means that motorists may purchase any amount of parking time and then move from any metered parking space to any other metered parking space anywhere in the city for the amount of time purchased on a single parking ticket until its expiry.
Among other changes are that an enforcement grace period of 15 minutes will be introduced, meaning that no clamping will be conducted until at least 15 minutes after expiry of a parking ticket receipt. (For example, a vehicle parked at 1:00 pm, and the driver has purchased one hour of parking, will not be immobilised until 2:15 pm.)

There will be no immobilisation fee penalty for a one-month adjustment period. During this one-month period, vehicles that are immobilised for non-payment of metered parking fees, will be required to pay only the metered parking fee for the time that they were immobilised and nothing else. (For example, during this one-month period, if a vehicle is immobilised at 10:00 am for not paying fees, and the owner claims the vehicle at 11:00 am, he will be required to pay only $200 plus VAT.)

For six months (after expiry of the one-month adjustment period), the immobilisation fee will be reduced by 50 percent or $4000 plus VAT. The fee will be restored to $8000 after the six months.
Among other “special considerations,” are that businesses may apply for monthly parking permits which may be considered on a case-by-case basis. Businesses may apply for loading/offloading parking regulations, and official taxis and minibuses may purchase metered parking monthly passes for $12,000 per month, plus VAT. Residents may also apply for residential parking permits.