Vehicles swarm into Valletta following free parking scheme

2,537,866 vehicles entered Valletta in the first eight months this year, a staggering 90,738 more than entered it in the same period last year, Transport Malta statistics show.

The data shows that since the removal of all Controlled Vehicular Access (CVA) charges for vehicles parking in Valletta CVA zones after 2pm on weekdays and all day on Saturdays, Sundays, and public holidays, cars entering Valletta increased by 3.7% over the same eight-month period.

Parking in a CVA zone for over half an hour on weekdays between 8am-2pm is still subject to an hourly 82c fine. Valletta residents and their relatives, emergency and official vehicles, public transport vehicles, motorcycles, electric vehicles, vehicles capable of carrying more than 10 people, regular delivery workers, doctors who practise regularly in Valletta, vehicles owned by people with special needs, and open air market hawkers are all exempt from these charges.

The free parking scheme’s aim was to encourage more people to visit Valletta, bringing life to the capital.

Initial results show that it has certainly worked in that regard. 651,128 vehicles parked in CVA zones after 2pm on weekdays in the first six months of this free parking scheme, up by 37,077 over the corresponding period last year.

Also, 234,335 vehicles parked in them on Saturdays, up by 23,036.

Perhaps unexpectedly though, the average parking duration has actually gone down in both cases. The average parking duration in CVA zones on Saturdays in the first six months of this free parking scheme was 4.54 hours, down by 0.25 hours (15 minutes) from the corresponding period last year.

For those parking after 2pm on weekdays, it decreased by 0.15 hours to an average of 4.4 hours in the same period.

“This shows that the aims of the scheme, to increase accessibility to visitors entering Valletta while at the same time discouraging parking for long periods of time, are being reached,” a Transport Malta spokesperson said.