Expensive Parking

IMG_3789
Originally uploaded by wanhashim

If you one of those who have to drive to work in Kuala Lumpur, most of the time you will have no choice but to park your car at one of the empty lot converted as parking areas. The charge is based on per entry basis and the rate is very demand oriented.

In the above picture, the charge is RM8 per entry. If you parked your car for a day let say 8 hours then the rate is about RM1 an hour given that you did not have any urgent business that force you to drive your vehicle. If you do, then your RM8 is only for a few hours and if you are unlucky you have to re-enter the parking lot and pay another parking ticket.

The charge can be very expensive if you only wanted to park for a short while. For example if you only wanted to do some transaction in a bank, you will have no choice but to pay the expensive parking rate for nothing. I think the operator of the parking lot knew that most of users are so desperate to find a parking place that most of the short term users will have to use their service.

The operator will change the rate based on demand. If the demand is so high, the rate can go up to RM10 per entry (I think they can even go up to RM20 per entry). If the demand is low, the rate can is reduced to RM5 only.

Well, if you have a piece of land in the heart of a city, don't develop the piece of land. But, charge people for using the land. In this case, you can work out the mathematic on the average daily income that they reaped from the users.

Therefore, unless there are efficient and comfortable public transport especially during peak hours, users can park their cars at home and ride the public transport which is much cheaper.