As of: February 6, 2024 8:02 a.m
Should SUV drivers pay higher parking fees? This has just been decided in Paris. According to the transport authority, this is currently not an issue for Hamburg.
The Senate only issued a new fee schedule in December last year, the authority said on Monday. “A change in parking fees, also broken down specifically by size or weight, is not included and is not an issue,” it said.
Legally problematic
Apparently this is not a political issue because it is legally problematic. SUV is not an objective criterion. If you want to pay more for larger cars overall, you will also have to pay a lot of station wagons from families, for example. Freiburg recently failed in court with its proposal to link the costs of resident parking to the length of the vehicle.
Sympathies from district office leaders of the Green Party
In Hamburg, however, there is apparently sympathy for a special regulation for SUVs in the districts. The fact that parking fees are based on the space actually used is “a convincing proposal,” said Michael Werner-Boelz (Greens), district leader of Hamburg-Nord, to the “Hamburger Morgenpost”. Altona’s district boss Stefanie von Berg (Greens) recently wrote to the text message service “X” that if she had her way, “we would need a resident parking permit with a fee scale depending on engine capacity and size.”
Paris: Higher parking fees for SUVs according to citizen survey
In Paris there was a majority in a citizen survey on Sunday called for a tripling of parking fees for heavy city off-road vehicles. The city administration thus pushed through its plan to charge SUVs and other heavy cars for one hour to park 18 instead of 6 euros in the center and 12 instead of 4 euros in the outskirts. Only visitors should pay the special tariff for SUVs in Paris. Residents should be excluded, as should tradespeople and care services. The tariff should apply to combustion engine and hybrid models weighing 1.6 tons or more and electric models weighing two tons or more. However, participation in the vote was only just under six percent. The city administration did not want to accept objections that the result was hardly representative.
Environmental aid against “monster SUV”
With a view to Paris, German Environmental Aid recently called on all German cities to set higher parking fees for heavy SUVs. “These monster SUVs are increasingly blocking sidewalks and green spaces and endangering people who are on foot or cycling,” said Federal Managing Director Jürgen Resch.
AUDIO: Podcast Hamburg Today: Paris is leading the way – higher parking fees for SUVs (13 min)
Further information
In some municipalities, higher parking fees for SUVs have already been discussed. It has not yet been introduced anywhere. more
This topic in the program:
Hamburg Journal | 02/05/2024 | 19:30 o’clock