Speaking to the council’s operations and performance committee this week, Gray said overall library customer feedback was “staff great, parking bad”.
“Numbers are down and I think it’s pretty clear the parking situation up at Queen’s Park is the principal cause of that.”
He said he had been monitoring parking at Pukenamu Queen’s Park, Campbell St and Cameron Tce three times a day since October 2024.
“It was bad when the Sarjeant opened, in terms of being over-full, and it seems to be getting worse.
“Last month, at the library carpark alone, there was an average of 19 cars parked there between 10.15am and 1.45pm – the peak hours.
“There are 10 car parks, by the way. People are parked on the grass.”
Te Whare o Rehua Sarjeant Gallery, next door to the library, reopened to the public last November and had 74,024 visitors by May 1.
Before the Sarjeant’s redevelopment began in 2019, the library carpark had 19 spaces.
A report commissioned by the council last year said parking provided in the upper and lower areas of the park would satisfy “calculated daily peak demand” but there would be a shortfall with concurrent events in all the park’s buildings.
Whanganui Deputy Mayor Helen Craig said council staff were preparing a report that she hoped would provide short-term parking solutions.
“I would encourage this council at the next annual plan [2026/27] to make sure they’ve really got a plan to dramatically improve the parking situation.”
She said the Sarjeant would also be impacted by a lack of spaces.
“We’ve got the cafe there and it can only do better in terms of income coming in.
“If you don’t have people walk in the door, you might not get these donations you need.
“I would like to see staff look at the option of making the [Whanganui Regional] museum forecourt much more available for public parking.”
Gray said while he could count occupied car parks, he could not count the people “who turn up, drive around looking for a park, don’t find one, then drive away”.
“For library customers, a significant proportion of them are elderly, and a significant proportion of the rest are parents with children or caregivers with children.
“Books are quite heavy, so parking nearby is a good thing.”
He said original landscaping plans for the area between the Sarjeant and the Davis had 27 car parks, which may have been sufficient.
“It’s basically where people are parking on the grass, to be honest.
“If that was tarmac instead of grass, it wouldn’t currently be turning into mud.”
Mike Tweed is a multimedia journalist at the Whanganui Chronicle. Since starting in March 2020, he has dabbled in everything from sport to music. At present his focus is local government, primarily the Whanganui District Council.
