Warrnambool City councillors voted 4-3 last night to support a parallel parking plan along Ryot Street between Koroit and Lava streets after a petition was sent to the council relating to vehicle congestion.

The council will proceed with its roll-out of on-road marked parking bays along both sides of the street with a mixture of two-hour, all-day and residential parking permits.

However, councillors Peter Hulin, Brian Kelson and Peter Sycopoulis claimed the measures did not go far enough and suggested that indented parking was necessary.

Warrnambool mayor Michael Neoh said the council understood the concerns of nearby residents and believed the parallel parking measures were the best way of addressing the problem.

“The problem at the moment is that parking was very informal in that area. There was parking on nature strips and that caused issues for those residents,” Cr Neoh said.

“Parallel parking will act as a traffic calming facet along Ryot Street as well as addressing the problem of parking availability.”

Cr Neoh said the measures should be viewed as a trial and further steps could be taken in the future if there was a need for extra parking spaces.

Cr Hulin said there was indented parking along Ryot Street south of the Koroit Street intersection, setting a precedent for the Koroit Street to Lava Street block.

“The obvious solution is to introduce indented parking,” he said. 

“It would mean extra parking spaces, far more than a few parallel parks, and you’d still have plenty of nature strip.”

Cr Sycopoulis said many Ryot Street residents felt they had not been properly consulted on the matter.

“Indented parking is already right there on Ryot Street, so I don’t see what the issue would be if that was replicated,” he said.

Council chief executive Bruce Anson said parking around the hospital’s neighbourhood was dynamic given the development of the region’s cancer care centre nearby.

“We have a growing regional hospital and with that comes changing needs,” Mr Anson said. “The council will work to address parking issues that are presently there and there is the opportunity to reassess at a later date.”