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[StuMcL]

Our scheme has a massive issue with tenants and owners parking in the visitors spaces (we have about 40 of them), furthermore we installed bollards to stop people parking in areas not designated for parking (which made access dangerous to carpark users) which seems to have made the parking in visitors places worse.

We did a survey and more than 75% of respondents said visitors parking should be for no more than 24 hours, likewise 80% said we should police parking in the visitors spaces more heavily.

One option we are looking at is to engage our local council in a Strata Community Parking Agreement, whereby we install signage outlining parking hours etc and the local council rangers then patrol the visitors carpark and fine offenders.

Has anyone looked or used this system before?

Has anyone had a by-law drawn up that outlines more strictly a car parking policy that I might be able to have a look at?

• This topic was modified 8 months, 1 week ago by .

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[Jimmy-T]

StuMcL wrote:

One option we are looking at is to engage our local council in a Strata Community Parking Agreement, whereby we install signage outlining parking hours etc and the local council rangers then patrol the visitors carpark and fine offenders.

I understand very few if any councils are prepared to get into these arrangements, for a combination of the following:

• Parking officers patrolling indoor areas is a Workplace Health and Safety issue
• Very few strata schemes have a clear definition of what illegal parking is
• This often becomes a dispute between neighbours
• Strata schemes get anxious when they realise otherwise compliant residents might also be pinged for parking over the boundary lines of their parking spots
• It’s just not cost effective.

To get back to point 2 on that list, have you defined in a by-law what a “visitor” is.

Is it someone who doesn’t live in the building but stays for a couple of hours.  How about someone who has a friend in the building, who stays all day.  Is someone who frequently parks overnight a visitor?  How about the additional Airbnb guest for whom there is no parking space attached to the lot? How about the romantic partner of a resident who parks all weekend, every weekend? Or the family who use their garage as a rec room, or their parking space for storage.?

There is no universal or even state-wide legal definition for this – which is good.  It means you and your neighbours get to define it to suit the lifestyles of the majority in your block through a by-law.

So, in your position, I would canvass all the resident to find out how they feel a visitor should be defined in a by-law, then get that by-law passed and adopted.

Once you have that in place, you can start issuing breach notices to residents and owners. Once you have sorted them out, you can turn to non-resident rogue parkers – a whole other box of snakes. A secure parking entrance gate controlled by electronic fobs would be a start.

But first you have to define what your block feels defines a bona fide visitor.

The opinions offered in these Forum posts and replies are not intended to be taken as legal advice. Readers with serious issues should consult experienced strata lawyers.

[kaindub]

I approached Sydney region local council seeking such an arrangement. They were happy to do it but at a cost of $20000 per annum. I can’t recall  how fines were applied or how the fine revenue was split.

i figured that we would have had to have a massive parking problem for this to be cost effective.

[kaindub]

Just adding to my previous post. When enquiring I spoke to the chief parking infringement officer in the council. He was very helpful with suggestions how to relieve some of the parking problems, even to the extent of offering ( for free) traffic restriction signs.

[Quirky]

It’s really a difficult situation, but the local council is unlikely to cooperate, unless there are special circumstances involved, such as your building being part of, or beside, a commercial centre. If you think about it, the only thing the parking inspectors can police is time restriction, such as not occupying a parking bay for more than 24 hours? All they have are car registration numbers, and this cannot separate real visitors, from resident’s and stranger’s cars. This is only a minor problem with visitors parking, and the major problem is with residents parking their (2nd) cars there, or people using it who are not actually visitors to your building.
In our building we improved a similar situation a lot by installing a boom-gate to allow access to the visitors parking bays. A visitor must have a building access fob, or buzz a Unit in the building, to get the boom gate to open. Along with CC TV cameras, and an active strata committee, this has cut the inappropriate use of our visitors parking area a lot. But your building may not have a suitable access system in place, nor a CC TV system? In that case, I’d suggest you arrange a security company to put together a proposal to upgrade your building’s security, by installing a boom gate to limit access to the visitors parking, and to upgrade the building’s security generally, with an electronic access system, an up-to-date intercom system that can operate the boom gate and entrance doors remotely, and a CC TV camera system covering the common areas, including the boom gate, driveways and visitors parking areas.
You seem to have a lot of visitors parking bays (40) so you should check the building’s Development Application, and with the local Council, to see if that number are all mandated legally. If not, then you have an option, once you get a boom gate, to lease a few of the bays to residents, or other people, which could help with the costs of this upgrade.

[fchat56]

Hi,

The best way to resolve this is through having a by-law.

It can then be used for preventing abuse of common property, initially through Notice of Compliance and then through NCAT.

Strata Schemes Management Act 2015 sets out the steps in section 146. It requires that a notice to comply must be in a form approved by the Secretary (which is, for this purpose, NSW Fair Trading – one can download a notice to comply form from their website).

In regards to asking local council for help, that is more complex. It can happen but it is not the best or most efficient option.

We have personally been involved in forcing City of Ryde Council to take action against large strata complex who allowed, without approval, parking on public land behind the complex. Basically, a group of owners and tenants illegally used public recreational space for parking (officially named “Unnamed Park Lot 202 DP848752, 440 Lane Cove Road”). It took us significant time to get Council to act but we won in the end: Ryde Council Reference 2158948.

[Author]

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