Know your options when someone’s parked in the wrong place

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CouncilServices

Published: 29 June 2023

Sometimes people park in the wrong place for good reasons, but if it’s illegal, or someone is parking repeatedly where they shouldn’t, there is something you can do about it.

Click this link to find out more about parking in Lower Hutt. You’ll see the regulations we follow and what to do in different situations.

The link will take you to a page that explains what Council can do to stop cars being parked in the wrong place.

You’ll see the regulations we follow and what to do in different situations.
We can issue a parking ticket if people:

  • don’t pay for parking (this includes going over the parking time limit)
  • overstay the time limit
  • park unsafely – for example, on broken yellow lines or on the footpath/cycle lane or parked within 1 metre from the vehicle entrance or inconsiderate parking (especially ensuring emergency vehicles can access the road)
  • park a vehicle on a road with an expired warrant of fitness or licence label or certificate of fitness.

Why are there not always enough carparks for everyone?

We understand how frustrating it is to have carparks taken away. The shift to not require new developments to provide car parks is a result of changes that councils have been directed to make by the Government as we move toward having lower carbon emissions though owning fewer cars.  

The National Policy Statement on Urban Development came into force on 20 August 2020.  
This directed councils to:

  • Not set minimum car parking requirements in the district plan
  • Remove objectives, policies, rules, or assessment criteria that have the effect of requiring a minimum number of car parks to be provided for a particular development, land use, or activity.

Council removed the minimum car parking rate requirements from the District Plan on 29 September 2020.  

People can still choose to provide on-site car parking if they want to, and many new developments are still doing this, but Council can no longer require that on-site parking must be provided where a development has none.