Wishart calls for HIAL car park charges rethink

Beatrice Wishart has called for a rethink of HIAL (Highlands and Islands Airports Limited) car parking charges at Sumburgh Airport, following news that there would be a return of car parking charges at HIAL’s Sumburgh Airport next month.

Wishart has revealed figures obtained from HIAL by a Freedom of Information (FOI) request that the car parking charges did little to offset the airport’s overheads, with the percentage of income generated topping 1.42% in 2019-20 and as little as 0.06% in 2017-18. Data also revealed that the initial cost for the original automated ticket machines cost £118,122.

After obtaining the data Wishart called on HIAL to scrap parking charges and consider alternative travel options to ensure islanders were not harangued by yet another cost to live in the isles. The introduction of charges did little to reduce car parking at the airport and, in order to avoid fees, had pushed drivers to park their cars in ‘free to park’ areas around the airport.

Ms Wishart said:

“Car parking charges at Sumburgh Airport is just another tax on islanders simply for living where we do, and I remain in disagreement with HIAL’s policy.

“It would appear from the FOI that income from parking charges is not needed to keep the lights on at the airport, and with broken equipment that couldn’t cope with the weather it has been somewhat of a fiasco already.

“There are pragmatic and practical ways of ensuring reliable transport to the airport and I urge HIAL to look at this again.”