Grahamstown businesses owners said they were happy after their meeting with Hedraweb – the implementing agent for Grahamstown's new parking system – and Makana Municipality, at the Grand Hotel on Friday 11 March.
Grahamstown businesses owners said they were happy after their meeting with Hedraweb – the implementing agent for Grahamstown's new parking system – and Makana Municipality, at the Grand Hotel on Friday 11 March.
The meeting came about as a result of complaints by the business community that the system was negatively affecting their businesses and that they feared they would lose customers.
Marius Schmidt, general manager of Buco Hardware Eastern Cape, said there had been a lot of information-sharing in the meeting and they had tabled all their concerns.
"The meeting went well. We are moving in the right direction and soon we are going to consult again and see if we can get some solutions to the concerns that we are having."
He said around 90 percent of the businesses in Bathurst Street had attended the meeting, along with Hedraweb and Makana Municipality.
"I think its good we got together because we are all on the same page. We have listed our concerns and so let's see what happens. Probably in two weeks time there will be another meeting, but the date will be confirmed," said Schmidt.
Robert van der Merwe, owner of Hi-Q Len's Auto in Bathurst Street, said the meeting had been very good and there was now a way forward.
"We are very happy with how the meeting went and they [Hedraweb and the municipality] are willing to look at the concerns.
"One of the major problems is long-term parking. Staff working at businesses – where do they now park? They need an alternative and on that issue we took a lot of discussion.
"There were a few recommendations to them, including a card system. That would be for long-term parkers. The card can be loaded with the payment and you can just swipe it. There would obviously be a reduced rate for long-term parkers," said Van der Merwe.
He said business owners had also raised the issue of the exact role of the attendants operating the machines and what their job was meant to entail.
"Are they meant to watch cars or are they not?
"We want to understand what each person's job description is and we are waiting for that answer," Van der Merwe said.
"There is a service level agreement in place, but it has not been well communicated to businesses and consumers, so we don't know what they are meant to be doing.
"They gave sort of a guideline and cleared a lot of things up. They have three months to get this thing operating," he added.
Hedraweb operator, Thabo Dlabantu, echoed the opinion that the meeting had been a positive one.
He said there had been a large representation of businesspeople from Bathurst Street who wanted clarity about the system.
"They said they didn't have any information on what the new parking system is about and that there had been no consultation before the implementation of the system.
"But they are very supportive of it and also we discussed ways of how we can work together and make it work. Positive outcomes of the system were also discussed.
"We expected everybody concerned with the system to attend the meeting so that their questions could be answered. But negative people don't come forward and voice their dissatisfaction.
"There will be another meeting soon, but the date has not yet been confirmed. The businesspeople will meet alone first and then a date will be set," said Dlabantu.
Makana's Head of Traffic, Coenraad Hanekom, could not be reached as he was on leave at the time of writing this piece (Friday 11 March).
