The motorists and business owners are not happy with a plan that aims at cutting free evening parking in downtown Auckland.

The council believes that this move will help in creating more space for parking; however, many describe the move as a useless attempt.

Alex Swney of Heart of the City said: “Its laughable... we certainly haven't asked for it... people jumping out of restaurants an hour into their meal (to) feed the meter is not conducive to city building. It's just nuts.”

Presently, majority of pay and display carparks are free after 6pm and also on Sundays. However, it has appeared that Auckland City Council is looking towards expanding payment times to 10pm from Monday to Saturday and throughout the day on Sundays.

The move was denied to be a simple revenue gathering step by the Acting Parking Operations Group Manager, Rick Bidgood, who claims that the plan has been created to free up spaces for people to more easily, and access inner city entertainment, restaurants and bars.

He explained that after 6pm, there is hardly any space left to park, with many of the city's 18,000 apartment dwellers parking up for the night.

“It will cost $500,000 to reconfigure the pay and display machines in the CBD, but even with conservative 30% car park occupancy, they are set to make a $1million a year,” says the council.