At the time council said its “forensic investigation of car parking in the Merimbula central business district” showed that “Merimbula had a surplus of parking, 725 spaces beyond the regulatory requirement”. However council counted on-street parking, something that should not have been included.

Mr Green and other property owners lodged a complaint with the Ombudsman.

“Within two weeks of the complaint being lodged, the council backtracked, acknowledging that the report was wrong and admitting that the car parking needs of developments could only be met in off street public car parks,” Mr Green said.

“It did not inform the councillors that the report was wrong nor did it issue a press release. At least several hundred spaces in public car parks need to be added in Merimbula,” Mr Green said.

In the meantime Merimbula’s Alice Street car park could become two-hour restricted instead of the all day parking that currently exists if council follows the recommendations of  the traffic committee.

The Merimbula Chamber of Commerce voted unanimously to have parking in Merimbula moved to three hours to provide sufficient time for visitors to lunch and shop. The proviso was staff would park outside of the CBD to leave spaces for tourists and overcome the loss of 127 car park spaces that were part of the Woolworths development in Main Street.

Originally Main Street developer Gerald Rawson was to make all 127 spaces available throughout construction but council amended his DA to making the spaces available within 12 months of the start of construction. However the start date has now become a matter of debate.

Councillor Robyn Bain, who is the chair of the traffic committee said three-hour parking would not achieve the objective of higher traffic turnover.

“Staff will continue to use the spaces on Alice Street, move their cars at 12 noon and then run the gauntlet after 3pm. Our experience at Bega tells us three-hour parking doesn’t achieve the objective of high traffic turnover,” Cr Bain said.

There are concerns two-hour parking in Alice Street could see cars migrating to the RSL’s car park when it opens at 10am. The traffic committee makes recommendations on which council votes.