Melbourne Zoo wants 1000 new car parks built in Royal Park – potentially in a multi-level car park – documents released under freedom of information show.

The zoo is continuing its campaign to create extra parking space, meeting with Melbourne City Council several times over the past 18 months to push for more of Royal Park to be used for cars.

An internal Melbourne City Council memo, released under FOI, shows Melbourne Zoo's request for 1000 more car parking spots in Royal Park.

There are already 3000 car parking spaces in Royal Park, with about half allocated to the zoo.

Emails and reports by the city council, released under FOI to a local resident, show the zoo expects its visitor numbers to jump from 1.4 million a year to 2 million within five years.