Palm Beach is plagued with traffic congestion and a lack of parking, according to residents. Credit:Dean Sewell Mr West said the hardest area to park was around Palm Beach Wharf in Pittwater Park, where residents fight with tourists, commuters and local businesses for parking spots. "There are various people competing for it," he said. "There are local residents who want access with timed parking to the shops that are there. There are the offshore residents who want to park for days and days and use it as a repository for their cars." Mr West said drivers also parked vehicles along Barrenjoey, Iluka and Palm Beach Roads, sometimes blocking driveways and causing traffic snarls. "So what happens is the car park gets full, all the streets get full and it all becomes very congested on weekends and holiday periods," he said.

Michael Regan, the mayor of Northern Beaches Council, said there was a high demand for parking in Palm Beach, particularly on weekends and in holiday periods. Credit:Dean Sewell Difficult problem to solve Mr West said parking in Palm Beach and Whale Beach was a challenge because of the area's hilly geography, popularity with tourists and narrow, winding roads. "It's a difficult problem to solve," he said. "It was solved at Church Point by building a multi-storey car park, but that's difficult to build at Palm Beach." Competition is fierce for parking spots near Palm Beach Wharf in Pittwater Park. Credit:Dean Sewell

Michael Regan, the mayor of Northern Beaches Council, said there was a high demand for parking in Palm Beach, particularly on weekends and in holiday periods. "The steep topography means constructing additional parking is potentially cost-prohibitive and such a facility would likely impact on the visual attraction of the area," he said. The council will instead trial a parking strategy that directs vehicles to nearby car parks and promotes the Careel Bay Playing Fields car park as a park-and-ride facility during the peak summer period. "It prioritises local residents by providing more higher-turnover 4P and 8P spaces on weekends as well as dedicated parking for offshore residents through a new permit system," Cr Regan said. The council will also investigate ways of preventing the resale of parking permits on online sites.

Public transport solutions The Liberal member for Pittwater, Education Minister Rob Stokes, said: "Councils often face difficulties managing fluctuating demand for parking in unique coastal areas." Mr Stokes said the NSW government was trialling an "on-demand, point-to-point vehicle service" that allowed commuters from Palm Beach to book a car to and from Mona Vale's B-Line bus stop. "This innovative service is designed to encourage more people to adopt public transport and reduce pressure on commuter parking – particularly in areas where demand is sporadic or where it can be difficult for traditional buses to access," he said. A Transport for NSW spokesman said more than 3200 weekly bus services had been added in the Northern Beaches as well as a morning peak bus lane.

"This provides more incentives and opportunities for customers to leave the car at home or at a new park-and-ride facility, which will improve the performance of the broader network for those people who need to drive," he said. Mr West said the new B-Line bus service between Mona Vale and the Sydney CBD, and discontinuation of several bus routes, had worsened traffic and parking issues. "You have to change buses if you want to come to Palm Beach," he said. "The northern beaches doesn't finish at Mona Vale. It finishes at Palm Beach and the buses should run to Palm Beach." Cr Regan said the B-line had provided "travel time benefits". However, he said: "We remain concerned about the lack of public transport options east-west and are actively advocating for rapid-transit public transport between Dee Why and Chatswood."

How bad is Sydney's traffic? David Levinson, a professor of transport in the School of Civil Engineering at the University of Sydney, said Sydney's traffic was worse than other Australian city's because of its population and topography, which concentrated traffic onto fewer routes. Sydney is the 29th most congested city in the world, according to GPS provider TomTom, which listed Mexico City, Bangkok and Jakarta as suffering the worst traffic snarls. Los Angeles (12) and London (25) also had worse traffic congestion than Sydney, while roads were easier to drive in Paris (35), Auckland (40) and New York (49). Driving conditions were also much better in Melbourne (58), Brisbane (96), Adelaide (100) and Perth (105). "My first law of transport is that everyone complains," Professor Levinson said. "In a small town, the complaint about the one traffic light on Main Street might seem ridiculous to someone from Sydney, but it feels valid to those who otherwise don't stop at all."

More public transport and increasing the cost of driving and parking were potential solutions to traffic congestion. Loading Professor Levinson said roads (and parking, trains and buses) had a fixed amount of capacity, but "more people try to use them than there is space for at the peak time, and people queue up, and they are much less crowded the rest of the day". "If we priced them properly, we could avoid the queues altogether and waste less time," he said.