Sparking the city's move to electric vehicles into life is the aim of a parking proposal being put forward by one of Wagga's councillors.
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Councillor Georgie Davies has called on Wagga City Council to investigate reserving some of the city's most in-demand parking spaces for electric vehicles only.
She believes making the sought after spaces in council-owned car parks and outside popular venues off limits to petrol-powered cars will catapult the adoption of electric vehicles and help the city achieve its net zero emissions targets.
"We know that the world is moving towards electric vehicles and I think Wagga City Council has its role to play in encouraging their uptake," Cr Davies said.
"Our budget, as everyone knows, is really stretched and I think this could be a really good, low-cost way that council can support the electric vehicle movement."
The motion being put forward by Cr Davies calls on the council to investigate which parking spaces in premium locations could be made 'electric vehicle only' and the costs associated in doing so.
She is also calling on council staff to consider whether these spaces would be able to support charging infrastructure in the future.
"I don't think this would be a forever option. It's just a short to medium initiative to help catapult electric vehicle sales in our region," Cr Davies said.
The lack of available parking in the Wagga CBD has been a major topic of discussion over the years and the suggestion that the number of spaces available for the average driver could be reduced has raised eyebrows.
Cr Richard Foley said he would likely support the move to put together a report on the proposal, but he did have reservations.
"I suppose it depends how many people drive electric vehicles in Wagga and at this point in time I don't think electric vehicles are affordable for the average Joe," he said.
The councillor also said he personally did not think having exclusive spots would be enough to convince someone to buy an electric car.
"But let's get the report and make a decision when we get that back in a few weeks," he said.
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Cr Davies is confident the restricted parks would not have a major impact on the city's parking situation as it would be "just a few spaces".
"I'm really imagining that in a whole car park it would just be two or three spots next to the disabled spots and on somewhere like Fitzmaurice Street it would be just two spots," she said.
Wagga resident Dev Murkherjee, one of the city's first electric vehicle owners, believes the reserved spots would have to be paired with charging equipment to attract people to make the switch.
"I don't believe a reserved park alone achieves much but if you couple them with charging equipment, that would definitely go some way to help," he said.
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