Top 10 most expensive UK cities for parking
Leeds city centre is the priciest location outside of London for parking, new research has revealed.
Regular visitors to Cardiff and Manchester might also want to turn away now, with the findings showing that the average monthly parking cost would be more than £300.
The study, by vehicle inspection specialists, HPI Check, analysed the price of some 200 car parks across the UK, initially concentrating on the average cost of parking for a full working day (9am-5pm) over a calendar month (Mon-Fri).
Researchers also looked at the big potential savings on parking costs, simply by looking half a mile out from city centres.
Top 10 monthly parking rates
- London – £694.80
- Leeds – £355.40
- Cardiff – £327.40
- Manchester – £302.20
- Glasgow – £286.60
- Liverpool – £238.40
- Newcastle – £223.00
- Sheffield – £178.00
- Sunderland – £166.40
- Birmingham – £148.20
At the other end of the scale, drivers in Birmingham enjoy the cheapest city centre parking with an average monthly cost of £148.20 – or 140% cheaper than Leeds.
The research also looked at hourly rates, and not surprisingly, London was on the top of the list an average rate of £9.10. This is a huge contrast to Sunderland – the city with the cheapest average hourly rate of just 79p per hour.
Some of the most expensive car parks to leave a car for one hour were in London (£20), Cardiff (£15) and Leeds (£12.50).
Top 10 hourly parking rates
- London – £9.10
- Manchester – £3.18
- Cardiff – £3.14
- Leeds – £3.06
- Glasgow – £2.65
- Liverpool – £2.59
- Sheffield – £2.14
- Newcastle – £1.72
- Sunderland £0.79
The study also revealed that motorists can save as much as £220 a month simply by looking a little further afield.
Top 5 highest saving cities when parking 0.6 miles outside a centre
- Manchester – £223.30
- Cardiff – £221
- Leeds – £192.02
- Liverpool – £133.60
- Sunderland – £133.20