THE number of people parking in Dublin city centre has shown a dramatic decline in the past three years, figures from the city council show.

Revenue from on-street parking fell from a high of €29.2m in 2007 to €26.8m last year. When the full figures for this year are published, a further fall is expected. Revenue to the end of November came in at just €21.1m.

Dublin City Council, which has for years encouraged people to travel to the city centre on public transport, is now offering cut-price parking in an attempt to reverse the decline.

In a new initiative, half-price parking is being offered to drivers who switch to the 'parking tag' method of payment. The parking tag is an electronic device fitted to the windscreen of a car.

Sources in the city council said a variety of factors were to blame for the fall in parking revenue within the city centre. One of these is that there was still a perception among the public that it was difficult to drive around the city centre, said a source. Another reason was that drivers were put off by the recently introduced 30kph speed limit on some city streets.

Many people had switched to other modes of transport, particularly bicycles, and were no longer bringing their cars to work, the source added.

There had also been a decrease in the volume of on-street parking available as spaces disappeared to make way for new developments and for 'bike parks' for the Dublin City bike scheme.

Aebhric McGibney of the Dublin Chamber of Commerce said lessons could be learned from the handling of recent initiatives that had discouraged shoppers.

"For us, this latest initiative is a positive step and it is equally important that the city council sees the importance of promoting it," he said. "On-street parking does help promote car traffic into the city and it is important that we keep explaining to people that the city is open for business.

"About a year and a half ago, there was talk of a car ban in the city centre, which was simply a bus corridor. Unfortunately, the city has not always handled stories regarding car transport as well as it might have."