Council To Introduce Free Parking Period For Fridays

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THE Council is to introduce a two and a half hour free parking period for Fridays which they hope will entice people to ‘linger longer in Tralee’ and support local businesses.

A special meeting of Tralee Municipal District was held yesterday at Kerry County Council to discuss the parking issue, after Cllr Toireasa Ferris brought a motion earlier this month looking to cut the pay-parking hours in Tralee from 8.30am-6.30pm to 11am-4.30pm.

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Councillors were asked to come up with costed alternative suggestions by Council management as the proposal was not considered realistic due to budget constraints.

After meeting privately, a compromise was reached between councillors and management where there will be a free parking period on a Friday afternoons from 4pm to 6.30pm – later dubbed ‘Freebie Friday’ by Cllr Ferris and ‘Linger Longer In Tralee’ by  Cllr Norma Foley. The initiative is to start in the coming weeks.

At yesterday’s meeting, Director of Services, Michael Scannell said they will promote this initiative with local businesses.

The idea is that people will come to town on a Friday afternoon to do their shopping, leave the car and go for a meal and a drink and not have to worry about getting a ticket.

“It’s a sound, modest proposal that markets a very special aspect of Tralee,” said Mr Scannell.

Mr Scannell said the budget for 2017 had already been agreed and there were a number of projects ongoing or pending for the town which required Council funding, so monies could not set aside for extended free parking initiatives.

Some of these projects included the Smarter Travel Initiative, the Denny Site development, they have made a submission to Failte Ireland to upgrade the tourism infrastructure in town – which, if successful will require Council funding – they are also looking at developing a link between the Mall and Market Square via Barrack Lane which will require funding.

He said Tralee was at the cusp of a wave of investment and when work is completed Tralee will be a town which will attract people from far and wide to shop and visit.

Councillors were unanimous in asking town centre businesses to get behind the initiative and that they would work with them to promote Friday shopping and entertainment.

2 Comments

  1. Would have thought 10am to 12pm would have suited Traders better, proposed time is jammers anyway why encourage more people to try and park when parking spaces are scarce?

  2. Des O Connell says:

    As a regular visitor to Tralee from over the border in Cork, I must say that it shocks me as to how run down and dirty the centre of Tralee has become. And the people to blame for this are the councillors and town planners who seem hell bent on coming up with half arsed ideas such as this free parking after 4pm on Fridays that will only make tiny changes when anyone looking in from the outside can see the Tralee needs a radical overhaul.

    The people of Tralee should be questioning their councillors and county council officials over such items for example as the appalling state of the Brandon car park. Why any visitor to Tralee would come back to shopping in the town centre having risked life and limb to walk in that car park, when they can go over to Manor is what has to be asked. Also the state of the paths. I here lots of stories of elderly people in Tralee having fallen while walking in town.

    Then we have the waste of time in council meetings when eejits discuss whether or not to invite the Donald to visit Kerry. Do they not realise that it was exactly this type of politics that got the America voters to turn their backs on politicians and vote in Trump? Council officials and councillors should be doing their utmost to improve Tralee in practical ways, to assist the businesses that are struggling . For example the first 30 minutes of parking should be free of charge. Car park surfaces should be improved both in the Brandon car park and in Stacks Villas car park.

    Remember these are the very same councillors that are due to get an increase of €3,600 in expenses allowances. Half baked decisions that they make do not affect their take home pay.

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