Spectre of car parking charges looms at Sumburgh Airport
Ryan Taylor
Air passengers may soon have to pay to leave their cars at Sumburgh Airport. Operator Highlands and Islands Airports Ltd (HIAL) is considering introducing parking charges to help plug a £1 million hole in its finances.
But isles MSP Tavish Scott has warned that such a move would meet with fierce resistance given the already high cost of flights even with the Air Discount Scheme (ADS).
Chief executive of Highlands and Islands Airports Limited (HIAL) Inglis Lyon told The Shetland Times the introduction of charges would go some way to helping improve revenue in the next financial year.
He emphasised that nothing was “fixed in tablets of stone”, but pointed out that parking charges planned for Kirkwall and Dundee airports were likely to yield £75,000. A third of that money will be used to supplement bus services meeting planes at the airport.
In Kirkwall, motorists will be charged nothing for the first 30 minutes, £1 after the first three hours, £2 for three to six hours and £3 to park for more than six hours.
“We’re introducing car parking charges at Dundee from 1st December 2009, and we will be introducing car parking charges at Kirkwall by June 2010,” Mr Lyon said.
“We are now looking at Stornoway and Sumburgh. There is nothing fixed in tablets of stone, but if the proposals hold water they will be taken to the board for decision.”
Mr Lyon said current provision of public transport and Sumburgh’s overall location would be taken into account before any charges are introduced.
He said a decision would be made before the end of the current financial year, as HIAL’s revenue budget will be slashed by over £1 million in 2010/2011 because of the current economic climate.
Mr Scott said he had turned down a similar proposal from HIAL when he was transport minister for the previous administration.
“The flights to the island airports are lifeline flights and, even with the benefits of the Air Discount Scheme, the cost of flying is high,” he said.
“For passengers who use Sumburgh it would not be cost effective to provide the sort of dedicated regular fast bus service which airports such as Edinburgh have.
“And, of course, passengers come from all over Shetland, not just from a central point such as Lerwick. So very many passengers need to use their cars to get to the airport and need to leave it there.”
He added a “significant number” of passengers were patients flying south for medical treatment with the NHS paying for their flight.
“If car parking charges were to be introduced, do HIAL think that the NHS should pick up the cost, or do they think that patients should pay? Neither option is acceptable.
“He [Mr Lyon] should be aware that, if HIAL does try to bring in the charges, they will meet with fierce opposition.
“This will not just come from me as the local MSP, but from many others who already pay more than enough to use their lifeline air services to the south.”
Ross
Imagine 400 cars “left” in Lerwick, if everyone got the bus in!
Andrew
There will be an option to parking charges for those having to park long term, say for their 2 week summer holiday or visiting relatives at Christmas. Drive to a village within a mile of the airport, park up, then either get the bus or call a taxi for the rest of the journey. Taxi dirvers will be happy, but I’m not sure the villages surrounding the airport will be. We don’t all drive to the airport just to park and be a nuisance, we go there for a reason. Shetland is not really comparable to Orkney in this sense as the option of a ferry journey takes a couple of hours from Orkney and more than 12 from Shetland.
Steve
I don’t think it’s helpful to make this a Shetland v Orkney issue – we have different details (I hate the drive to Sumburgh from Lerwick on a dark wet night, while Kirkwall airport is, well, an easy drive from Kirkwall but a serious walk) while sharing a remoteness and suffering high air fares – I was told by a Loganair pilot that the N Isles routes are Flybe’s most profitable.
We in Orkney do have far better ferry connections to the north coast, but that’s not much use for a trip to hospital in Aberdeen. All of Orkney’s inter-island routes fly out of Kirkwall, too, so for commuting islanders and itinerant teachers, costs will increase.
Again, like Shetland, people travel to the airport from all over Mainland, so the benefits of cutting traffic are likely to be insignificant – I still have to drive 14 miles to Kirkwall Centre if I’m to take a bus rather than 15 miles to the airport. And where do I park in town?!
Will local farmers compete? Will an unintended consequence be that instead of a single carpark the area will be littered with carparks? Will taxi drivers be in short supply?
Many questions to be answered, but I think our experiences will be similar. Let’s not play one off against the other. It is interesting, though, that Western Isles pilot “road equivalent tariff” ferries while Northern Isles get to pilot airport parking charges; surely nothing to do with politics…