The decision to reintroduce parking fees downtown will be taken at an extraordinary meeting of the City Council's Committee on Business, Labor and Technical Affairs (KSNAT) in April. The decision is made when the municipality no longer believes it can afford to offer free parking.
During the preparation of the case, the municipality's traders have protested loudly, including handing over a petition against the proposal, which was signed by more than 4000 people.
Lousy timing
Trade Oskarshamn now writes a press release that it fears that parking fees will drive customers from the center and they also believe that the timing is lousy.
"The pandemic, inflation, energy costs and rent increases have led to an extremely sensitive situation for the trade as a whole. In this situation, reintroducing parking in the city center provides an additional threshold for customers to visit the downtown stores," it writes.
KSNAT's chairman, moderate Lucas Lodge, told Oskarshamns-nytt this week that he does not believe the fees will kill the downtown trade.
"This is something that we don't do lightly. But now we want to do it together with the trade and the property owners, so that it is as good as possible.