Dear Editor,
Under the present regime of $200 per hour, a car parked in the city of Georgetown between 7am and 5pm (while its owner was at work) would incur charges of $4000 in two working days.
The Town Clerk is reported as stating that M&CC’s income target from parking meters is $240,000,000 annually. Mathematically speaking, at 20%, this translates to a price tag imposed on the citizenry of $1,200,000,000. Much of the difference of $960,000,000 will be sent abroad to be dissipated at destinations unknown.
At 100% capacity, it would take approximately 2500 cars, each parked for ten hours per day and five days per week to realize this revenue. 50% capacity is more likely (assuming that the public boycott ends), which translates to 5000 cars.
To achieve a similar result, the city can if it chooses sell monthly parking passes in the form of stickers, to be attached to the windscreen of the car. Most streets (not all) could be reserved for vehicles with such passes. If the city were to issue monthly passes permitting vehicles to park, annual revenue of $240,000,000 would be realized by the sale of monthly stickers at $4000 per month to the same 5000 cars. The city could sell yearly stickers at a discount and weekly stickers at higher rates. Goods vehicles, minibuses and hire cars could pay for stickers at a different rate.
The occasional visitor to Georgetown would be able to park in an unrestricted area. The daily commuter to Georgetown would probably prefer to pay the $4000 per month rather than jostle every day for those few unrestricted spaces. There would be no hassle of buying credit and finding the parking meter to get a parking slip. A shopper could park in Church Street for groceries and then drive to the bank in Camp Street without paying twice.
No money would leave Guyana.
But we could send the parking meters back, because we wouldn’t need them.
It would then remain only for City Hall to supply credible annual accounts, properly audited, to account for the expenditure of its newfound revenue. This may be too much to ask.
Yours faithfully,
Timothy Jonas
