JustPark is a smarter way to find a parking space, if you drive. Rather than pay big car park companies huge amounts in towns and airports, just sign up and use the app to find people who earn passive income to rent out their garage, driveway or small ofifices (or empty spaces in small hotel car parks) at weekends and low season. This space is not used, and you save a fortune too. Sometimes it costs more to park your car at the airport, than to go on holiday!
Councils say they don’t have money, yet they could use the app to rent out council car parks at weekends (often hundreds of spaces, when staff are not working. JustPark works with councils who wish to do this. Some parking space owners earn up to £4K passive income per year. Just think how much money councils could earn if they rented out unused spaces, for money to invest in walkable communities and litter clean-ups. Renters save around 30% on average and some also rent out EV charging spaces.
why is England’s parking so dire?
One way to free up thousands of parking spaces is for more people to join car-sharing clubs. This is when one car is used by around 20 people through the day (the car club pays for the car and everything else, you just rent by the hour). This then obviously frees 19 cars off the road as the car is mostly in use (unlike most cars that sit idle in parking spaces most of the day). Most car club vehicles are new greener models, so would have huge effects in reducing both traffic and pollution.
Another reason why our parking is so bad, is because councils give licenses to huge multi-storey car parks (often lit up at night, causing light pollution to birds and wildlife). And many people avoid finding spaces, as councils often have meters that don’t give change, earning a lot of passive income for doing nothing.
why do hospitals charge so much for parking?
This is a contentious issue, with hospitals collectively earning up to £3 million a year, with many poor and elderly relatives not able to visit relatives in out-of-town hospitals (and likely can’t afford taxis). Prices have risen 50% to ‘make up for losses’ during the pandemic. Not just patients, some nurses are visiting food banks as a huge chunk of their salary goes on parking in order to work, if they don’t live locally.
Even if the money is reinvested back into hospitals, something needs to change. One solution would be to build smaller hospitals within walking distance of towns, instead of building huge buildings miles away, with no way of getting there by foot. Local non-emergency ‘cottage hospitals’ could also take the burden off emergency services.
Motorfinity compared prices nationwide of hospital car parks. The most expensive in London charged almost £80 for 24 hours (and almost £20 for 6 hours – likely the average time for a wait at A & E in the city). Yet Newcastle hospitals were also almost as expensive, yet with a lower average income.
