r/Glasgow Tools

Title
Author	eenbiertje
Comment	I'm sympathetic to the idea that with no other feasible means of getting to their workplace, that NHS staff should or could be given free, exclusive parking spaces. It's not where'd I'd start from though. The underlying cause of this problem is that so many of these modern hospitals were constructed on the outskirts of cities, with terrible public transportation options. It's a scandal this should have been allowed to happen. Hospitals are a huge generator of journeys - whether staff (by the thousands) or patients or visitors to patients. They are possibly even the single largest individual trip generators by building, even compared to other massive trip generators like out-of-town shopping centres, stadia, retail parks or airports. So if they couldn't be built in more central locations already well-served by public transport, I would say the state has a public duty to ensure that public transport network expands to cover them. For the benefit of workers and patients and so as to avoid increased congestion on roads leading to the hospital. To an very limited extent this happened at QEUH, with investment in a specialised transport hub area. Even that is not great though, as only a few bus lines run through it. It's also an incredibly difficult place to access by bike. What I'm getting at is these things should have been built with a holistic view. How do they connect to neighbourhoods nearby and further away, in a way that doesn't make travel utterly car dependent. To get back to your question... I'm uneasy with providing free parking as a solution generally, as it only encourages and cements the utility of individual car journeys, which comes with wider costs the whole way along the route from people's driveway to their workplace. It should be the aim to improve public transport and cycling connections above all else, but until they're good enough, yes I could see the reasoning for hospital workers getting secured parking, perhaps at the cost of patient/visitor parking. Free though? Not convinced.
Reddit Link	https://www.reddit.com/r/glasgow/comments/sf43b7/parking_queryviews/hupu6iv/
Created	Sat 29th Jan 2022 1:33pm
Status	normal ()

I'm sympathetic to the idea that with no other feasible means of getting to their workplace, that NHS staff should or could be given free, exclusive parking spaces.

It's not where'd I'd start from though.

The underlying cause of this problem is that so many of these modern hospitals were constructed on the outskirts of cities, with terrible public transportation options. It's a scandal this should have been allowed to happen. Hospitals are a *huge* generator of journeys - whether staff (by the thousands) or patients or visitors to patients. They are possibly even the single largest individual trip generators by building, even compared to other massive trip generators like out-of-town shopping centres, stadia, retail parks or airports.

So if they couldn't be built in more central locations already well-served by public transport, I would say the state has a public duty to ensure that public transport network expands to cover them. For the benefit of workers and patients and so as to avoid increased congestion on roads leading to the hospital. To an very limited extent this happened at QEUH, with investment in a specialised transport hub area. Even that is not great though, as only a few bus lines run through it.

It's also an incredibly difficult place to access by bike. What I'm getting at is these things should have been built with a holistic view. How do they connect to neighbourhoods nearby and further away, in a way that doesn't make travel utterly car dependent.

To get back to your question... I'm uneasy with providing free parking as a solution generally, as it only encourages and cements the utility of individual car journeys, which comes with wider costs the whole way along the route from people's driveway to their workplace.

It should be the aim to improve public transport and cycling connections above all else, but until they're good enough, yes I could see the reasoning for hospital workers getting secured parking, perhaps at the cost of patient/visitor parking. Free though? Not convinced.