EuroPark profiting off hospitals?

It would appear that the only argument for free parking at a hospital is based on emotive arguments. Logically speaking, it makes no sense.

babyducklings1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118930728#Comment_118930728

How much is it over there?

23 skidoo

I have to use a Dublin hospital once a month for a chronic ongoing medical condition. The hospital uses pay and display. I also have to regularly use the Mater which is often filled with match goers.

The cost of using these car parks are the same regardless of whether the user is attending the hospital or pissing off to town for whatever other reason, and the car parks are similarly priced to other urban car parks.

So what’s the net result? No disincentive for park and ride people abusing the car park and massive inconvenience and financial burden for genuine in and out patients.

Why can’t hospital car parks have a barrier system and validate (free of charge for patients ) and subsidies for visitors and heavily charge the clowns going to matches or shopping.

Why won’t this happen? Because the cash cow will dry up. Sick people are seen as a cash cow in Ireland .

Flinty997

The Mater Car Park is full on match days with supporters. It's not even dedicated the hospital. Temple Street doesn't even have parking. How many years was parking in the mater on rubble on a derelict site. Blanch sold off their land for housing. New children's hospital had parking issues before it's even built.

Parking is a shambles. We don't have 24/7 public transport. The excuses for not sorting it all out is pitiful.

They could have a parking tag system and discounts and validated parking for patients and visitors. Especially for those with long term illnesses and conditions.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118932671#Comment_118932671

This discussion is about Hospitals which aren't Private property(ignoring the issues in Ireland with ownership of the freehold ground beneath them by Religious Orders) but the point of delivery for a vital service which is care of those who fall ill.

As part of planning applications for any public building the provision of parking within the curtilage would be a key element and failure to allow for adequate parking to enable the building to serve its intended purpose would result in the planning application being rejected.

Parking is an integral part of any offering be it a church, a school or a hospital. Ensuring that it isn't over or under-provisioned is part of the planning process. Ensuring that the public building as a resource achieves its maximum facility to the benefit of society involves amongst other things ensuring that the on-site parking provided is neither lying idle nor abused and this can be achieved through the setting of a reasonable per-hour parking fee. Parking on site should never be treated as a profit centre as provision of health services to the Public in Ireland is not considered a "for-profit" service of the State.

23 skidoo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118933516#Comment_118933516

Right. So cancer and dialysis patients should have to pay. Good to know.

What’s your opinion on preventing access to the car park for people who are park riding or going to gaa games?

magicbastarder

I have to use a Dublin hospital once a month for a chronic ongoing medical condition. The hospital uses pay and display.

yeah, pay and display for hospital goers is lazy and obnoxious. if it was ticket and pay on exit they could at least look into setting up tiered charging.

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118933516#Comment_118933516

And yet you ran out of facts, logical arguments and went straight to blithering on about emotions. Ironic.

https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/arid-30780510.html

imagine all the costs of being sick with a long term condition and then someone adds even more costs to it. Nice.

Flinty997

This argument has been going on for years. Especially with the NCH. Usually by people who never use the car parks it visit a hospital on a regular basis..

Car parks are big revenue. They aren't going to want to change that anytime soon.

magicbastarder

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118933493#Comment_118933493

They paid for it when it was built. It has minimal on going costs.

land given over to parking is land foregone for other uses, and that is the cost. hospitals cost money - an eyewaterring amount of money - to run, and available land, and setting aside available land to car storage, is a significant cost.

a parked car is anathema in a very real sense to efficient use of the land available to a hospital; in that a parked car is quite literally a car not being used. it takes up not that far from 0.5-1% of an acre to not be used (based on a flat car park). a car park of one acre, which is (at best) full with 150-200 cars, is an acre given to storage of items not in use. so why shouldn't hospitals charge for the land? if you can think of another example where your presence in a hospital takes up 15sqm of the grounds, but you're not charged for that, it'd be interesting to hear.

Flinty997

Its hypocritical to argue the cost (or the use) of the land, when they've refused for the new NCH free land, with almost unlimited expansion, in favour of first at the mater, then at James, sites with extremely landlocked and expensive to build one. If you want to maximise space and reduce cost you'd build a box. What did they build...an oval. Blanch even sold off their land.

In the case of the mater, they are using the parking for people going to football matches. Why does a hospital provide parking for football matches. Why is the parking in all hospitals not restricted to people using the hospital. You can't argue its critical infrastructure if you don't care what its used for, are wasteful with it, and let anyone park in it.

AndrewJRenko

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118933605#Comment_118933605

Imagine all the costs of being sick with a long term condition, and not being able to afford a car - and looking out the window at the Cancer Society running a big campaign that will only benefit better off cancer patients.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118933571#Comment_118933571

Parking is no more a 'profit centre' than the cafeteria or the gift shop. It is fairly standard practice to outsource these services to specialist businesses, and get a contribution to hospital costs. Are people going to throw a temper tantrum and stamp their feet over having to pay for a cup of tea? Sure it's only hot water, and they already have the boiler, so it's no cost to them.

What specifically is it about parking that attracts this inflated sense of entitlement from better off people? Clearly we've spent far too many years designing society around the needs of middle-class motorists, so any little chip away at their entitlements is seen as a massive attack. Let's keep on chipping.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118933571#Comment_118933571

The private property in question are the cars.

Why anyone should expect the govt to provide for the free storage of them at public facilities is beyond me.

If you can afford to drive, you can afford the parking fee. Don't want to pay it, use an alternate mode of transport, simples

Timfy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118933526#Comment_118933526

I was undergoing extensive treatment at Royal Berkshire hospital in Reading, twice a week, four hours at a time. Parking on site would have been £5.00 p/h. It was cheaper for me to park in the town centre and get a taxi out! No idea what it costs now, this was 15 years ago.

Flinty997

you should pay extra if you get a taxi as you must be loaded. In fairness if you got a taxi you could have cycled. Of course there shouldnt be storage for bicycles at the hospital either. You should really walk there.

You can always do a drive by and push whomever is sick or immobile out of the car as you drive past. Which has the added benefit you don't have to babysit with them for 24 hours in ER (or where ever they are going) and look after them. They can use hospital resources for that. They wouldn't need storage for People then either like waiting rooms and family rooms. Or cafes, or shops.

You'd be able to outsource this parking for other things like matches or local business or housing then.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118933886#Comment_118933886

You just can't seem to grasp that nothing exists in isolation and that infrastructure must be reasonably accessible to all to serve its purpose. You can't grasp this because you don't want to grasp it.

...and then the cognitive dissonance there when you bemoan the lack of more bicycle parking yet expecting "somebody" to magically provide it. You are a hypocrite. https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/103738989#Comment_103738989

All at the same time as militating for more and more and more dedicated bike lanes to the exclusion of every other road user irrespective of whether they be on foot or donkey or quadricycle or car or van or ambulance or fire-engine or lorry or any combination of above. Your Apartheid against ALL OTHER ROAD USERS is clear to see.

Go off and come to terms with the fact that your strongly held beliefs(because beliefs are all that they are) are not internally consistent and do not tally with the views of broader society or its institutions. The rest of us here are sick of you constantly polluting EVERY thread with your anti-car vitriol. It is tiresome and I actually am begining to suspect that at a basic level you are mentally unwell because it has obviously taken over your every waking thought.

TheTruth89

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118933730#Comment_118933730

I wonder are you living in the real world at all, your arguements and the comparisons you try to bend into some warped form of proof are just nonsense. To be honest I think the way you are arguing is completely disingenuous, your trying to pit it as favoritism towards cancer patients with cars rather than look at it as a small thing that can take away one other headache for people already burdened with enough hardship.

From a compassionate perspective alone most decent people would want that provided free of charge in this country, I'm glad people like you are outliers, I find your stance and reasoning disgusting at best and speaks volumes about you as a person and your morals.

As for your previous dig about "your taxes paying for my relatives care..." Just shows how delusional and detached you are, don't worry the pittence you provide personally isn't the corner stone holding up the health sector.

AndrewJRenko

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118934286#Comment_118934286

Parking IS reasonably accessible to all, with a small fee to cover the costs of storing your private property on public space. Perfectly reasonable.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118934585#Comment_118934585

"your trying to pit it as favoritism towards cancer patients with cars rather than look at it as a small thing that can take away one other headache for people already burdened with enough hardship."

That's absolutely what it is - special privileges for cancer patients with cars, at the expense of others. If it was combined with some kind of transport programme for ALL cancer patients, that would be something. But it's time we moved on from parking privileges for better off people at public expense

23 skidoo

What ever about charging or not charging patients.

Why don’t hospitals take steps to deter or prevent non-patients or non-visitors from parking?

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118934286#Comment_118934286

I had you on my ignore list for so long that I forgot why, your stalky rant just reminded me, later lol

macvin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118933469#Comment_118933469

Very rarely are sick people using the spaces. It mostly visitors.

Considering that the hospital care is mostly at no direct cost to the patient, a few euro for safe and secure parking is a small price.

Where free parking is provided it almost always sees extensive abuse and then you will have no parking spaces.

L1011

Debate here is getting personal and off-topic. Infractions have been given. Back on topic please, remembering this is not Commuting & Transport.

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118934963#Comment_118934963

What % of people in a hospital are visitors?

What % are people going to appointments, what % are family providing transport. What % are staff.

Hospital care is no cost to the patient. Seriously.

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118934859#Comment_118934859

I'm not sure why you object giving sick people privileges than some one using the car park who's not even using the hospital.

Or why you think only wealthy people have cars. It's not 1940. I'll bet people in this thread have bicycles that are more expensive than many peoples cars. By your logic they should remove bike racks so that rich people can't use them.

elperello

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118934943#Comment_118934943

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118934963#Comment_118934963

I think some way of restricting access be it by a charge or patient validation is necessary to stop non hospital users parking.

For long term patients or visitors a discount system should be mandatory.

Anyone who has a car would surely use it to make a patient or visitors journey a little easier.

Flinty997

There's a recent piece on it here.

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/state-run-hospitals-take-in-12m-a-year-from-car-parking-charges-1.4531372

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118934960#Comment_118934960

DaCor, I too use ignore lists but those comments are for the benefit of others not you. Some of them might be swayed by your argument that storage space should not be paid for by the public. Armed with this information, they can better judge the merits of your argument. It is only fair, is it not?

Hospital parking space should be priced at a level to dissuade abuse and no higher. Some Hospitals see it as a stream of revenue from a captive audience which is the friends and family of loved ones at a time of concern and worry for both the Patient and their visitors.

cbreeze

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118931733#Comment_118931733

Correct. If you haven't used up all the time you've paid for, you can give the ticket away so someone can avail of your kindness and not have to pay😌

macvin

Interesting that sinn fein are looking for free parking yet most hospitals in northern Ireland charge for parking. Surely they should lead by example and show it being done where they have the power to do so.

Seems many hospitals in the south have parking deals. Tallaght has a six entry ticket for use in a 3 month period for €25, so €4.25 per session. Others have similar deals.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118935623#Comment_118935623

Does SF talking out both sides of their collective mouths surprise anyone anymore lol