Press
A German city wants to abolish parking fees. She hopes that this unusual measure will revitalize the city center.
Herzogenrath – Parking can be expensive, especially in big cities it can quickly add up. However, one city in North Rhine-Westphalia, Herzogenrath, is bucking the trend of rising parking fees – and in an unusual way. In Herzogenrath, 25 parking meters are defective and repairing or replacing them would be costly. In the city center it is not unusual to come across the message “Machine out of order – please use parking disc!”, like this WDR reported.
Free parking in Herzogenrath: City relies on parking discs – residents are happy
The city administration has determined that replacing the defective machines would cost 150,000 euros. There are also ongoing costs for emptying, maintenance and paper. A repair is simply too expensive and it would not be profitable to purchase new parking meters.
According to the report, the city of Herzogenrath plans to completely abolish parking fees from September. In the best case scenario, this would bring the city 40,000 euros in annual revenue from the machines. Residents welcome the planned change. The city hopes this will revitalize the city center. This should also attract customers from the neighboring Netherlands.
Herzogenrath wants to abolish parking fees: “Relieve business people and citizens”
The proposal still has to be politically approved, but Mayor Benjamin Fadavian (SPD) sees this as a mere formality: “From September 1st, the parking disc should be sufficient in the central areas of Herzogenrath and relieve the burden on business people and citizens,” he said WDR quoted. This is good news for the city north of Aachen, where parking can often cause stress and sometimes disputes.
It should be noted that users of the parking app only have to pay online if the parking machine is working properly. Otherwise, the tried and tested parking disc is sufficient. But caution is advised, because setting the parking disc incorrectly can be expensive.
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