The recent announcements of paid parking at Westfield Shopping Centres in Brisbane has created lots of controversy over the last few months, but may end up being a bonus for local home and business owners.

Paid parking was introduced this week at Chermside Shopping Centre – with plans to implement it at Westfield Carindale in March next year.

The new parking charges at Westfield Chermside have had an immediate impact – leaving empty car parks and resulting in clogged local streets, increased traffic congestion, and the need for a local services club to employ security guards to monitor their own car park.

Parking Fees $20 per day

The new charges, which apply to vehicles parked for 3 hours or more, are designed to encourage commuters and long term parkers to look at alternatives. Parking fees can be as much as $20 for the day.

Shopping Centre staff have been allocated special parking areas, but have complained of half hour waits to get in, and are concerned that they will be forced to pay up to $20 a day if they miss out on one of the staff parking spaces.

Local Residents Cash In

Aside from the extra disruption and congestion being faced by local residents, some may actually be presented with an opportunity to earn some extra income. Some residents with a spare parking spot have already been approached by car owners offering to pay to park there. Home or business owners with an extra parking space in the driveway, garage, or yard may find that they are in demand, and can rent out their unused parking space on a casual, weekly or even monthly basis – with the potential to earn as much as $15 a day or $300 a month.

The average cost of renting a park in Brisbane now stands at $435 a month – or $43.50 a square metre – after growing 30 per cent a year since 2005.

One great advantage of renting your own parking space is that you get 24×7 access and can come and go as you please. Although more than $400 a month may seem light a lot to pay for parking, it is actually a bargain when compared to casual parking rates which are charged every time come or go.

Last year SpaceOut Highlighted in our City drive-in robbery – Brisbane carpark costs soar post that Brisbane drivers wishing to park in the city were  paying on average $45 a day (that’s over $200 a week), and the rates have continued to rise…. currently  Brisbane casual parking can cost up to $70 a day.

Collaborative Consumption

Renting out your unused parking space – or a spare bedroom for storage – or an unused corner or room at your workplace is a great example of the increasingly popular collaborative consumption movement, where people “share” resources.  For the space owner, it is a great way to earn some extra income, and for the space renter it is a great way to find a rental space that is cheap and convenient, and to save money on commercial rental rates.

SpaceOut provides a service which makes it easy for people with spare or unused space, to list and rent it out to those who need the space.

Read more: http://www.spaceout.com.au/blog/parking-space/brisbane-carparks-become-prime-rental-space#ixzz1Xy56Q09e

A NSW Government parking tax is being blamed for making city parking prices soar.  Parking fees have increased to such an extent that motorists are finding it cheaper to pay a parking fine than to pay the standard parking station fees.

After London, Oslo and Tokyo, Sydney was already the world’s fourth dearest city to park, but now the cost of meter parking in the city is set to rise even higher – to $7 an hour.

The NSW Government levy (which was doubled by the state labour government in 2009) forces hotels, councils and commercial carparks to pay up to $2040 a space every year.  The tax was supposed to discourage daily commuter traffic congestion in the Sydney CBD, however, because it is only imposed on offsite parking, it tends to encourage commuters to drive around until they find a kerbside park, which actually adds to the congestion.

Parking meter costs

At $7 per hour Sydney on street parking fees are the highest of all other major cities in Australia.  The next most expensive cities are Melbourne and Brisbane (at a maximum rate of $4 per hour), with Perth a little lower at $3.30 per hour, and Adelaide the cheapest at just 2.40 per hour for CBD parking.

So for on-street parking in Australian major city CBD’s (assuming you are actually allowed to park for more than an hour) you are looking at paying anywhere between $20 and $60 for the day.

Parking Station Fees

For off-street parking, or parking in commercial parking stations you can expect to pay significantly more (even in many cases at “early bird” rates), with Sydney CBD parking station rates costing up to $35 and hour or $142 per day. If you want the luxury of being able to come and go from, your parking spot as you please, you would normally expect to pay many hundreds of dollars a month.

The huge increase in costs associated with parking in Australian CBDs is fueling the demand for Private parking services like that being offered BY SpaceOut.  Spaecout provides a service that allows individuals and businesses with a spare parking space in areas of high demand, to rent it out to those desperately needing parking, but unable to justify the ever increasing costs of commercial parking services.  The parking space owner, turns their unused parking space into a regular income, and the commuter gets convenient and cheaper parking – often with 24×7 access.

See what’s currently available right now by clicking one of the links below :

• Sydney Parking Spaces for rent
• Melbourne Parking Spaces for Rent
• Brisbane Parking Spaces for rent
• Perth Parking Spaces for Rent

As Cyclone Yasi, hurtles towards the North Queensland coast, local residents from Townsville to Cairns are evacuating and scrambling for cover.

Cyclone Yasi – upgraded to cat 5, and likely to be more life-threatening than any storm seen in Australia in living memory – is steadily approaching the Queensland coast, and seems certain to dramatically impact on the lives of tens of thousands residents and businesses from communities such as Cairns, Innisfail, Ayr, Mission Beach, Port Douglas and may other areas in far north Queensland

Possibly even more damaging than flooding rains and destructive winds is the tsunami like storm surge that is expected to be at least 2.5 metres and could be a great deal more.

Thousands of local residents have already been evacuated, and latest estimates are predicting that over 30,000 households are likely to be directly affected.

How to get Help

Mandatory evacuation is in place in certain areas, and evacuation centres have been setup in many at risk communities. Listen to your local radio station for the latest news on evacuation centres. There is also an evacuation and information hotline 1300 993 191.

• If you are evacuating, you should also register as evacuee with the Australian Red Cross National Registration and Enquiry System – a service that is launched during emergency situations to help people reconnect with family and friends.
• For a life-threatening emergency, phone 000 straight away.

• For assistance regarding damage to your home, phone SES on 132 500 and they will come to your home once it is safe to do so.

If you have a specific need for temporary accommodation, pet minding, transportation or some other form of assistance you can create a “Help Wanted” listing (for Free) on HelpOut, and someone living in or near your ,local community may be able to help you.

How to Offer Help

Due to the size and unprecedented scale of Cyclone Yasi, it’s very difficult to predict which areas are going to be affected and how hard they will be hit.  However, coastal and low lying areas of North QLD, which are known to be flood prone are almost certainly going to be flood and/or storm surge affected.  Residents within the Local community who live on higher ground, or in more sheltered areas are already offering assistance to friends and family, but are also being urged to help anyone they can.

If you are able to offer temporary accommodation, look after someone’s pet, or offer any other type of support to cyclone victims, you can create a HelpOut listing (for free) detailing what assistance you are able to provide, and where it is available.

Once the cyclone has passed and the scale of devastation becomes better known, there is likely to be a Cyclone Yasi Support Appeal established so that people Australia wide can offer donations and financial support, but in the interim,  members of local communities impacted by Cyclone Yasi can provide direct support – buy offering help, or asking for help via HelpOut.

With much of Queensland and parts of New South Wales starting to recover from the recent disastrous floods, and regional Victoria in the middle of a flood crisis, tens of thousands of Australians have been directly affected, and many more have suffered.   These flood victims will need ongoing support and assistance for weeks and probably months to come, but what are the best ways to offer (and ask for) help ?

Financial Donations

Flood relief appeals such as the Qld Flood Appeal and the Victorian Flood Appeal (managed by the Red Cross) have done a superb job at raising funds to help support flood victims, and these appeals are clearly the best way for you to make financial donations.

Business Support

The recently announced Qld Flood National Business Donations Register offers a great method for businesses to offer support to flood victims (Australia wide), with many businesses already offering pledges for a wide variety of products and services.

How Can Ordinary Aussies Help?

There are still plenty of ordinary Australians desperate to help, but not sure how to  .  However, it is still very difficult for individuals, many of whom live in or near flood affected areas, to find out the best way they can help and support their local community.

if you have muscle or manpower to volunteer you can register with Volunteering QLD who are coordinating volunteer efforts in Queensland, but there are plenty of other ways that you can provide practical, hands on support for flood victims.  It is often the simple, seemingly little things, that can make the biggest difference in supporting those affected by floods.

An innovative new service called HelpOut, has been established specifically to connect those people who need help with those who are able to provide help.  This service allows individuals living in or near flood affected communities, to list the types of help they can offer.  Perhaps more importantly though, HelpOut also allows those people directly affected by flood, many of whom are in desperate need of assistance, to specify exactly the type of assistance that they need.

HelpOut allows people to search by location (town, suburb or postcode), and presents offers and calls for help on a map – so it is very easy to see what help is available (or need) in specific areas.

If you Need Help

If you have been affected by the floods and are in need of something specific, you can create a Help Wanted listing for free on HelpOut (or if you don’t have internet access, get a friend to do it on your behalf).  Enter your street name and town/suburb, a description of what you need, and (if you want) a contact number.  Your listing will be presented to anyone searching your area to see how they can help, they can then contact you (via our internal message system) to offer their services and exchange contact details.

If you want to Help

First of all, search your local area in HelpOut for Help Wanted listings to see if there is anyone seeking assistance already.  If there is already a listing for someone you can help, you can contact them and discuss how you can offer assistance directly.  If not, you can create a Help Offered Listing (for free) outlining what you have to offer and what area you are able to provide it.

HelpOut has been developed specifically to make it easier for local communities to help themselves. By putting people wanting to help, directly in touch with those needing help, we ensure that the support that is needed can be given to those who most need it.

For a list of suggestions as to how you may be able to help see : How You Could Help

In response to the QLD Floods, SpaceOut has launched a new section of the site – called HelpOut (http://helpout.spaceout.com.au) – aimed at getting help to those people affected by flood.

SpaceOut is very good at hooking up people who have something, with those that need something. HelpOut extends on this functionality, and helps local communities help themselves, by assisting the people who really need it.

We have already had a fabulous response – with hundreds of listings offering help. However, we currently have very few listing from people seeking help, as many of the flood victims are still without power/internet, and are busy dealing with other issues.

Help Wanted Listings are being taken up very quickly – evidence that people are keen to help, but need guidance as to how, where and when they can provide assistance.

Now and in the coming weeks and months, home and business owners affected by flood waters will continue to need assistance, in many different ways to put them on the road back to a normal life. The types of assistance required is going to become clearer as the massive coordinated volunteer programs wind down, and new, more localised and specific needs for help become apparent.

HelpOut is perfect for putting people offering help, in touch with those needing it – within their own local communities.

What Can You Do?

Obviously you should donate to the Flood Appeal if you can afford to. You should also get involved in volunteer programs (through Volunteering QLD for example). But one of the best ways you can make HelpOut as effective as possible, is to simply spread the word – particularly to those people who have been directly affected.

To help spread the word you can do any (or all) of the following :

• Email a link to this post to friends, family, colleagues and contacts, or pick up the phone and tell them about it.
• If you have friends or family directly affected by floods, consider posting a listing on HelpOut on their behalf (it’s free)
• Talk about HelpOut on social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter (we’ve added Facebook Share and Tweet buttons to the HelpOut site to make this easier for you)
• Download, Print off, and post up this Flyer in your workplace or around your local community, and in particular around flood affected communities
• Phone up talk back radio and contact you mates in the media to let them know about this free service
• Let us know of anything we could do to improve or promote HelpOut

We are confident, that with the support of SpaceOut members, and the community in general, that HelpOut can make a significant impact in flood affected communities on the road back to normality.

The rains that have caused the devastating QLD Floods appear to be moving south and have now also spread over the New South Wales border, with the Richmond River at Kyogle measured still rising, while Lismore is among the larger towns in the firing line of the Wilsons River.  The Brunswick River, which runs through Mullumbimby, is also liable to burst its banks, according to the weather bureau.

So far towns on the New South Wales north coast have escaped flooding, but if rains that are currently battering SE QLD and Northern NSW continue, it seems likely that areas of northern NSW will also experience floods.

A practical way to support NSW Flood Victims

It is very encouraging to see the level of financial support being provided throughout Australia via the various Flood Relief Appeals. However, with expected  flooding in and around NSW, with many  residents and business owners facing weeks and possibly months of ongoing hardship, there are many members of the local communities who are willing to lend a helping hand, but are not quite sure how to go about it.

Financial donations are obviously best to be made to the Flood Appeal, however it is not usually possible to ensure that these types of donations make it back to the local communities.

Donations of goods and items raise logistical issues with collection and distribution, but there are still plenty of things  members of the NSW communities are able to offer on a more practical and hands on level.  The problem is really how to match up the people wanting to help, with those who need the help.

HelpOut offers a simple way for Local Communities to help themselves

With the goal of making it easier for flood affected communities to help themselves, we have created a Free online service called HelpOut.  This service is aimed primarily at people living and working in their local community.

The types of offers of help that we anticipate will be placed on HelpOut are not just items or goods, but also offers of other practical and “hands on” support such as :

• Looking after a pet until the owner gets settled
• Washing and drying a load of washing
• Popping round (or an invitation over) for a home cooked meal
• Hosting a DVD night with popcorn to help things get back to normal
• Lending a car or trailer for a day or two
• etc..

In a nutshell HelpOut works like this :

• People wanting to Help can easily create a Free listing on HelpOut which explains how (and where) they can help.

• People needing a hand simply search in their local area to see who might be able to assist them.  If there is nothing currently listed that matches their needs, they can create  a Help wanted listing (for Free) outlining what type of items or service they need.

• Listings can include contact details, or if people prefer to keep their contact details private they can use our internal (anonymous) message system until they are ready to exchange contact details.

HelpOut has only recently been launched and so far, has relatively few entries, but we expect this to grow quickly, and for HelpOut to be most effective,  the people living and working in or near flood affected areas need to be made aware of this service.  One of the best ways you can help  those people who have been directly affected by the floods and need a hand, and those who have not sufferer so badly, but are willing and able to offer assistance, is to let them know about this service.

We would appreciate if you could take a look at HelpOut at http://helpout.spaceout.com.au and if you think that it could be of benefit to your local community, please spread the word by telling people about it, and forwarding on post to your friends, colleagues and contacts in and around flood affected areas.

We’ve also created a Help for Flood Victims flyer which you may like to print off, and post up in your workplace or around your local community.

Whilst floods are by no means a new thing to many Queenslanders, the current batch of flooding is so widespread and affects so  many different areas, they are having a much bigger impact than normal.  But what can be done to help

Whilst floods are by no means a new thing to many Queenslanders, the current batch of flooding is so widespread and affects so  many different areas, they are having a much bigger impact than normal.  But what can be done to help

Flood levels are still rising in many areas, and pretty much everything that can be done in preparation, already has been.  For many, it’s now a matter waiting to see what’s going to happen, and the moment, there is very little that anyone can do to assist.  However, when the floods start to subside, and people start to be able to return to their houses and businesses to see what is left, that’s when the community really needs to rally together to help wherever they can.

While flooding will have an impact on entire communities, there are some (perhaps many) people who are not in the direct path of the flood and who will receive little or no property damage to their own home or business.  On the flip-side, those who live or work in lower lying, flood affected areas may very well lose all of their household items, and will soon face the daunting task of mopping, and cleaning up the mess that remains – a task which will take days if not weeks of effort.

It’s moments like these that bring a community together – with most people who are able to help, being more than willing to do so.  The problem however, is to know what needs to be done, and work out how best to help those in need.

All concerned Australians, no matter where we live can of course assist by making donations via the Premier’s Flood Relief Appeal.  However, the people that need help, and those that are best placed to offer assistance are those that live and work in the flood affected communities themselves.  but putting the people with needs in touch with those who can provide practical assistance could be a problem.

SpaceOut is in a unique position to be able to offer a solution to this problem. The concept of SpaceOut is based around our ability to put in touch people who have something with those who need something – and we do this on a locality basis.  Whilst we normally do this with Space (Storage Space, Parking Space, Office Space, etc…), it does not take a big stretch of the imagination to see how this same model could be applied to the wants and needs of flood victims.

HelpOut – designed to Help Out QLD Flood Victims

We have spent much of today tweaking our website, and are very happy to announce the launch of a new service called HelpOut, which we hope will make it easier for people wanting to help and having something to offer, to get in touch with those in flood affected communities who could really  do with a helping hand.

Lending a hand doesn’t necessarily have to be something big, or dramatic, and in fact it is very often the small, simple things which make the biggest difference.  We’ve outlined below a very brief list of some of the things that have been suggested could be of benefit to flood victims – but there are bound to be plenty of other ways to help :

• Offer to care for a pet for a week or two until they get everything sorted out
• Drop around a home cooked meal (or invite them round for one)
• Offer to assist for an hour or two to clean/mop/wash their house
• Offer to wash and dry a load of washing
• Drop around with some cold drinks/water
• etc…

We have a bigger list of how you could help – and remember, it is not only home owners who are affected, businesses too are suffering, so if you run a business that has not been unduly affected, have a think about what you may be able to offer to help.

HelpOut is a completely FREE service that allows people to either list what items/services that are able to offer, or for those affected by flood, to outline what things they would find really helpful.

You can find at more about How to Help Qld Flood Victims or create your own HelpOut Listing now.

The next time you park your car in pretty much any major city in Australia or New Zealand, keep your eyes peeled for the latest parking spyware sensors that could be automatically dobbing you in to the nearest parking officer the second that you overstay your allotted time.

Automated Parking Infringement Sensors

The latest automatic parking sensors are being fitted to both free and paid car parking bays throughout Australia and NZ.  Theses sensors take a photo (including a timestamp) when your car arrives and if you stay longer than the maximum time (whether or not you have a valid parking ticket), will electronically notify the nearest parking patrol. These devices automatically take photos of offending vehicles with the time and date of the infringement recorded on the image.

The new system detects a vehicle’s presence in a designated area, recording its arrival and departure time – including vehicle overstays, through the use of sensors embedded in the parking bay. Information gathered is transmitted to the parking Officer’s PDA, when walking or driving near the parking space.  the parking officer can also be notified of nearby spaces that are close to reaching their limits.

Gone are the days of chalking tyres – parking Officers are now only needed to enter vehicle specific details -  with location and offence details automatically populated directly from the vehicle detection sensors in the ground.  It seems to me that a fully automated solution is not far off, so that days of parking officers may very well be numbered as well.  If I were a parking officer, I would be very concerned about how long my job was going to last for.

Council Parking Revenue

Unsurprisingly local councils are at pains to stress that this move is NOT a revenue raiser.  They “selflessly” claim that they are installing these devices simply to encourage people to limit their parking to  allotted times – resulting in greater sharing of the parking space and a fairer service to all motorists – yeah right.

Advertising materials for the product manufacturers clearly highlight the increased revenue benefits of installing their product – providing a case study citing figures for a potential increase in revenue of over 120% for a single parking area.

Sydney’s Lane Cove Council is the latest council to start using the technology, with 200 of the meter eyes about to be switched on.

550 parking sensors have been installed around Perth at a cost of $400,000, and they have already paid for themselves, whilst ramping up revenue 57%.

Devices of this type are already in use (or being tested) by councils all over Australia and NZ, including:

• ACT Ranger Services
• Adelaide City Council
• Auckland City Council
• Brisbane City Council
• City of Melbourne
• City of Perth
• City of Sydney
• North Sydney Council
• Waverley Council

Whilst the altruistic sentiment of “sharing” parking spaces seems reasonable, it’s hard to see this trend as anything but yet another thinly camouflaged money grabbing strategy by councils.

The best approach to parking, and the safest way to ensure you are not hit by hefty parking fees or exorbitant parking fines is still to secure your own private parking space.  SpaceOut, remains one of the easiest way for you to locate or rent out your own private car parking space, at a very reasonable price.