| Motorists will have to pay to park on the Riverside site from November 30 in a move designed to raise revenue and stop people who are not using the airport parking there.
Highlands and Islands Airports had admitted it planned to introduce the parking scheme in May, but “deferred” the date of implementation as a result of the poor economic climate.
Inglis Lyon, managing director of the Scottish Government-owned operator, today claimed passenger numbers had picked up sufficiently for them to go ahead with the move.
“From the end of the month, parking charges will be introduced,” he told the Tele.
“There are many reasons why we have decided to take this step.
“The first is that from April next year we are having £1,000,000 removed from our Government subsidy, which means we have to look pretty closely at our operation costs.
“Car parking charges is one measure we can take to help with this.
“We also want to stop the abuse of the car parking facilities by people not using the airport, as I have seen myself that this is a problem.
“What we had said previously is that we would delay implementing the charges until we saw improvements, and we are now starting to see our passenger numbers increasing in Dundee.”
But West End councillor Fraser Macpherson, who recently attended an Airport Consultative Committee meeting about the issue, said he has concerns the move may negatively impact on passenger numbers.
“In principle I don’t have an issue for charging non-airport users for parking,” he said.
“They have clearly had a problem with some people parking there just because it is free, quite frankly.
“My concern is I feel the parking that has been free at the airport is something that makes Dundee Airport attractive compared to the high charges at the likes of Aberdeen or Edinburgh.
“The worry is it could have a detrimental effect on passenger numbers — I, personally, would have preferred a situation where the charges would be refunded if you produced a boarding card.
“However, I have asked Highlands and Islands to monitor the passenger numbers and make sure this doesn’t happen.”
Under the new arrangements there will be a short-stay car park with a maximum stay of two hours charged at £1.40 an hour.
There will also be two long-stay car parks with charges of £3 for up to four hours, £4.20 for up to six hours, £5 for up to 8 hours and £5.50 for a full day.
A five-day rate of £20 and £28 for seven days will also be available. |
