Is anyone else also REALLY ANNOYED at having to pay, however small, fee at shopping mall car parks... For the sake of pickled pilchards, why do i need to pay if i am going there to do business as it were. I go to drei spitz in Basel now and again to do a quick shopping for the garden at OBI or MIGROS and everytime i have to remember that there is no free 1st hour and after i do my shopping i have to dutifully go and pay me 50 rappen it is not the money it is the attitude that rubs me the wrong way. What can we do

It shows that the Eco-Enviro-Nazis have won.

They don't care about the impact to the shops or the consumer.

The idea is that you are supposed to use public transport to buy your pickled pilchards. This obviously doesn't help if you are going to buy a wardrobe or garden shed but the principle is a good one.

Sihl City in Zurich opened with a prohibitively expensive car park with limited spaces to encourage people to use the public transport and, apparently, appease the VCS (strong lobby group against anyone using cars) who have the power to block plans for shopping centres and whatnot using the "pollution problem" as the reason.

The Dreispitz area of Basel has a real parking problem and the reason they charge you (and me) to park. There are many factories and offices nearby (The company I work for moved nearby at the end of last week and there was uproar at the cut in the number of parking places available to those that drive) and if the shops didn't charge a small fee (50 rappen is cheaper that a 2 Sfr tram fare) then the car parks would fill up with "non-shoppers" (just look at the IKEA parking in Prattlen in the week to see).

It is not an ideal solution, but on the whole it works. If you don't like paying why not use one of the other DIY shops the Basel area that do not change parking Bau+Hobby or Jumbo in Aschwil or anything along the 10 tram line into BL.

Pat

What about those who live out in the sticks, for godness sake , we dont all live on a 2 mintes walk to the tramlines. It seems just a fluke attmept to make everything effing carbon friendly and enviro!! Dont get me wrong, i do my shopping in the smallhold organic shops as much as possible and all my cleaning is environmet friendly and all my bulbs are energy saving and i cycle and walk as much as possible.Just for shopping, it is a little difficult to carry when you are laden and I dont want to eat Bloody tofu everyday There are otherways to encourage to folk to use public transport and in switzerland it is the best way of travelling anyway. Erm... switzerland is not a country where one really thinks of 50 rappen, it is the way it could have been handled like after one does 50chf shopping ones ticket is free or something like that come on guy dont turn me into a scape goat for environmentalism here.
P.s I dont eat pickled pilchards,

It is the only place i know

NEVER DO THEY!!!

No problem, just had to ask :

Here is a quick map with some of the places marked (including the OBI, you allready know about), Lyss = Garden Center and the Mirgo one I'm not sure of the name :

http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UT...3bc3515ef3eabd

Hope that helps

Pat

I think most large department stores would agree with you, and if I look at the Coop centre near where we live (which is a pay and display car park), it is not even enforced. The problem is that the ecologists insist that shopping centres charge for parking in order to let things ride when it comes time for planning permission. So whilst I understand that you may be disgruntled, it is not necessarily the fault of the store where you are buying your pickled pilchards...

From my understanding in Zurich at least, any new developments/renovations of carparks must charge a fee. I've seen many car parks that were free change to charging after renovation and/or companies that usually have free car parks end up charging at newly opened stores.

Letzipark is the only exception I can think of that does not charge (for upto 3 hours that is, after that you pay).

I'm not annoyed. Seems like a normal behaviour - there is a demand for a particular good (parking space) and there are people who are needing the place and willing to pay. In some places it's difficult to imagine what would happen if the parking space was for free.

I've been to few countries and this is a normal trend, especially in the commercial centres located in the city centre. Free space there is becoming more and more scarce (we're not in US, you know...).

I guess shop at the same place (Aarepark) I'm there at least twice a week and I can honestly say I never paid in 3 years.

A car park costs money. If the people using it don't get charged it means everbody gets to pay. How fair is that? Also you do probably live in the sticks because you don't like traffic and the pollution that comes with it. This is how it unfortunately is with car traffic, the people causing most of it are the ones least impacted by it.

You're not being charged to park at shopping centers, you're being taxed to park there. The moneys collected from parking fees go into community coffers. My place of employment has 2 floors of underground parking, over 15 years I've parked at work for free but the last nearly 5 years my employer now deducts a parking fee (presently 30.-chf. per month, 36.- starting in January) from our salaries to pay the parking taxes to the city.

Taxes on private parking in Switzerland? I can't find anything about this on Google. Which community are we talking about?

Look on the bright side, it's only 50cts, in the Uk, city centre minimum fees are more like £1.20 (CHF2.50)
However I do agree with the OP on this, it always hacks me off to have to pay to shop.

There's no way you should be charged a parking fee for shopping, it's absolutely ridiculous. Who would walk into a shop if there was an entry fee..no matter how small.

And if the businesses are worried about people taking advantage of free parking.. it's simple, just impose a nominal charge but have it cleared at the cash desk with a purchase.

All of them actually.. Here's an older article (2005) concerning the parking fees of a new Ikea in Spreitenbach where the city fathers had included to the building permits a 1.-chf. fee per hour tax for all vehicles parking at Ikea:

http://www.st.gallen.ch/news/detail.asp?ID=227783

As has been pointed out, it isn't the shops enforcing this, it is the environmentalists.

It would p*ss me off. Fortunately in my neck of the woods it's not an issue. Maybe it should be like shopping carts. You pay chf 1 or chf 2 when you park. When you pay at the supermarket check out you present your parking receipt and get your parking fee reimbursed.