Africa-Press – Botswana. In Botswana, every public debate on transport seems to revolve around roads: their poor condition, their expansion, or their endless congestion. What is rarely discussed is one of the quietest but most powerful determinants of how our cities function: parking policy.
Special Correspondent
For too long, Botswana’s urban centres have treated parking as a free good. Cars are scattered across pavements, squeezed into verges, or left all day in the most valuable commercial zones without any cost to the driver.
This is not efficiency; it is disorder. Worse still, it is a hidden subsidy that fuels private car dependence while undermining the principles of sustainable urban transport.
Free Parking Is Not Free
Every “free” space comes at a cost. Land in Gaborone’s Central Business District is scarce and expensive, yet vast swathes of it are handed over to vehicles without charge. The opportunity cost is borne by taxpayers, businesses and non-drivers. What this amounts to is an indirect subsidy to private motorists — making car use appear artificially cheap and distorting demand away from public transport, walking and cycling.
Paying for Parking as Policy
Introducing a fair system of paid parking is not about punishing drivers; it is about aligning incentives. In transport economics, when you underprice something, demand spirals out of control. Botswana already sees the effects: gridlock, pollution, and unsafe streets. Paid parking is a proven demand-management tool that keeps turnover high, ensures spaces are available for those who genuinely need them, and discourages unnecessary car trips.
Internationally, cities that have introduced rational parking charges have seen clear benefits: reduced congestion, improved air quality and revitalised public spaces. Closer to home, even smaller African municipalities are experimenting with smart meters, app-based payments and structured tariffs. There is no reason Botswana should lag behind.
CASE STUDIES: BEFORE AND AFTER
Nairobi, Kenya – From Chaos to Structure
For years, Nairobi’s CBD was notorious for gridlock. Free and underpriced parking allowed commuters to occupy prime spaces all day. Shoppers and short-term visitors could find no room, while others circled endlessly searching for a spot. In 2014, the city introduced paid parking via mobile money. Turnover improved, congestion eased, and revenue rose to fund improvements.
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia – Smart Parking in Action
Addis, facing pavement parking and unsafe streets, introduced automated smart parking in 2020. Modest charges plus digital enforcement discouraged long stays, reduced corruption, and quickly improved business access and traffic flow.
Cape Town, South Africa – Linking Parking to Public Transport
Cape Town’s solution was tiered fees: higher in the core, lower further out, integrated with the MyCiTi bus and cycling lanes. The results were higher retail turnover, reduced congestion, and more commuters using public transport.
Gaborone Parking Dilemma
There is no comprehensive inventory of parking in Gaborone but in 2011, the World Bank–supported Greater Gaborone Multimodal Transport Study already warned that Gaborone’s parking was unpriced and oversubscribed. The study documenting about 1,640 bays at the Main Mall, BBS Mall, African Mall and Old Industrial area, plus 200 on-street spaces along Queen’s Road and Botswana Street.
The consultants showed that a modest fee of just P1 per hour could generate nearly half a million US dollars annually for the city. Yet nothing was done. The study did not cover the CBD, which has around 1,000 formal off-street bays within commercial developments plus another 1,000 improvised spaces on vacant building plots.
The Government Enclave accommodates roughly 2,000 off-street spaces on vacant ground, while formal parking in government developments provide a further 1,000. The Old Lobatse Road Commercial Strip has another 1000 off-street places, shopping malls like The Field another 1000. The city’s universities and hospitals together contribute about 2,500 off-street bays.
In total, central Gaborone holds at least 10,000 formal and informal off-street parking spaces. And yet only one development — the Masa Centre, with 400 underground bays — actually charges for parking. The rest are free.
The Economics of Parking in Botswana
At a modest charge of P5 per hour for six hours a day, 300 days per year, the foregone revenue is roughly P90 million annually in Gaborone alone. That is money that could be repairing roads, improving lighting, or subsidising bus services. But the true costs go beyond lost revenue. Free parking generates negative externalities:
– Congestion. On-street parking removes lane space, slows traffic, and forces drivers to circle for spaces, adding unnecessary kilometres.
– Artificial demand. Off-street spaces that are free encourage people to drive when they might otherwise take a bus, carpool or walk.
– Inequity. Public transport operators pay for their ranks and layovers. A bus moving 50 people must pay; a private car moving one person parks free.
– Environmental harm. More cars mean more emissions, more fuel imports, and higher climate vulnerability.
This is why economists call free parking a perverse subsidy: it makes cars look cheaper than they are while society pays the price in congestion, pollution and inefficiency.
Parking Fees and Travel Demand
Free parking doesn’t just fill spaces — it inflates car demand. Using the price elasticity of demand for parking (about −0.2 in the short run, −0.4 in the long run), we can see the impact clearly.
Take a commuter who drives 24 km round-trip daily. With fuel and operating costs of about P60, free parking makes car travel relatively inexpensive. But add a P5 per hour fee for an eight-hour day (P40 total) and the cost rises to P100 per day — a 67% increase in generalised cost. Demand would fall by roughly 13% in the short run and over 25% in the long run as commuters adjust.
One of the main objectives for charging parking fees is to induce a change of mode from car use to bus. The press carried out a small study to determine what parking fees would induce a change in transport mode (Refer to the figure).
Now scale this to 60,000 cars entering Gaborone each day. A 10% drop in demand means 6,000 fewer cars daily in the short term while in the longer term a decrease of 25% would reduce demand for car travel by 15,000. This is not only major relief to congestion, but would enable expensive road investment to be deferred.
At the same time, parking revenues could exceed P1 billion annually. This is money that could transform urban mobility if reinvested into buses, sidewalks, cycling and smart traffic systems.
The conclusion is unavoidable: parking fees are both a traffic management tool and a fiscal instrument. They correct a hidden subsidy, reduce congestion and generate resources for reinvestment.
Figure: Break-even Parking Fee vs. Commute Distance
The Missing Link: A National Transport Policy
All these arguments point to a deeper problem: Botswana still lacks a comprehensive, up-to-date National Transport Policy. Parking, bus reform, non-motorised transport, e-mobility, and road safety are all connected, but without a policy framework, they remain piecemeal. For example – a paid parking strategy must be part of a plan to improve public transport, be it road or rail. While it must be noted, too, that promoting public transport is very much part of the government’s intentions to reduce carbon emissions, for which funding is potentially available.
A transformative government must complete this policy as a matter of urgency, embedding paid parking as a central tool for sustainable urban transport. Without it, decisions are ad hoc and disjointed. With it, they become a credible lever for modernisation.
Urbanisation is accelerating, car ownership is climbing, and congestion is worsening. Yet parking in Botswana remains a free-for-all that benefits a few and burdens the many.
The introduction of parking fees should not be an afterthought or a cash grab. It must be a cornerstone of urban transport policy, transparently implemented, reinvested locally, and supported by a broader national strategy.
Nothing is free, including parking. The matter is whether government has the determination and understanding to fully apply the user pays principle to car users.
Source: Botswana Gazette
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