IN RECENT months, finding a parking space in HDB carparks is an increasingly frustrating experience.
Most spaces are reserved for season parking. But just look around and it is obvious that many of the reserved red spaces are underused during the day.
Eventually, this may not do residents much good as the HDB will lose revenue, and the deficit may one day have to be recovered from season parking charges. Shortage of public parking will also discourage people from visiting residents, shops and food centres.
This will adversely affect business and social interaction.
I understand that reserved parking is necessary to ensure spaces are available to season parking ticket holders. However, public parking should not be adversely affected. The present red space system is inflexible and cannot allocate resources between the two groups well.
The problem is made worse when a season parking ticket holder occupies a white space. Other users are denied a space, while a reserved space may be left vacant.
The current red space system can be greatly improved if half the spaces are opened for shared use during certain hours, for example, from 8am to 8pm.
These shared spaces will then automatically accommodate relative demand between the two user groups. After 8pm, only white spaces are open to the public.
It is simple to convert half the red spaces for this purpose: Just paint them red and white and call them semi-red spaces.
If the overall distribution is roughly one-third each among red, semi-red and white spaces, it will likely do well throughout the 24 hours, including Sundays and public holidays. Actual allocation can be fine-tuned to match observed demand pattern.
