Niagara Health raises Douglas Memorial parking to $20 a day

Parking at Douglas Memorial will cost up to $20 a day starting Saturday, the second increase Niagara Health has ordered in less than two years.

The new rates take effect August 1 at all five Niagara Health sites, including the urgent care centre on Bertie Street. Niagara Health said the increase covers rising costs and pays for patient care, but MPP Wayne Gates called it a tax and blamed the Ford government for underfunding hospitals.

The rates Niagara Health has posted for August 1, beside the rates posted now at the Bertie Street lot:

• Half hour: $3.75, up from $3
• Daily maximum: $20, up from $19
• Monthly pass: $100.75, up from $96
• Staff, every two weeks: $33, unchanged

A driver who stays an hour will pay $7.50, up from $6, and the monthly pass will cover 30 consecutive days, down from 31.

The posted rates for August 1 leave out the $8 charge for stays of up to 12 hours now offered in Fort Erie, and Niagara Health has not said whether that option continues.

Fort Erie drivers pay at a meter in the surface lot, while the hospitals in St. Catharines, Niagara Falls and Welland use gates.

Parking earns the hospital system about $7.6 million a year, and Niagara Health said 79 per cent of that money pays for hospital operations and the remaining 21 per cent pays to run the lots.

The last increase, in December 2024, took the daily maximum to $19 from $16, when Niagara Health put annual parking revenue at about $4.5 million.

Rates had not moved for nine years before that, but Niagara Health said it held off on planned changes during the pandemic and that the 2024 increase did not keep pace with its costs.

The new rates follow the Ontario Ministry of Health’s Hospital Parking Directive. Under provincial rules set in 2016, any hospital charging more than $10 a day must sell five-, 10- and 30-day passes at half the daily rate. A patient and a caregiver can share those passes, and each one stays valid for a year from purchase.

Niagara Health said it will keep offering discounts to frequent users, including patients, visitors, staff, students and volunteers.

“This is a tax and it is a result of the Ford government’s cuts and underfunding, leaving our healthcare system to fend for itself,” said Gates in a post on Instagram.

Gates said the NDP asked the government to pass a motion ending hospital parking fees after the December 2024 increase, and he repeated that call when Niagara Health announced the new rates.

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