Dubai’s Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) and public-parking operator Parkin have announced five consecutive days of free public parking—from Monday, May 25 through Friday, May 29—coinciding with the Eid Al Adha holiday. Multi-storey car parks remain chargeable, but all on-street and zone parking will be free, a move designed to decongest airport and shopping-district traffic as millions of residents take advantage of the long break. To complement the parking waiver, Dubai Metro will operate on extended timetables, with the first trains departing at 4:30 a.m. and last services after 1:00 a.m. on peak days. Dubai Tram frequencies will also increase, providing a higher-capacity link between JBR, Dubai Marina and Palm Jumeirah hotels popular with business and leisure travellers. RTA has urged airport-bound passengers to use the Metro’s dedicated Terminal 1 and Terminal 3 stations to avoid road bottlenecks. For corporate mobility programmes, the free-parking window offers cost savings for employees using rental cars or driving personal vehicles to client meetings, while extended public-transport hours facilitate late-night airport transfers and shift-worker commutes. Companies should, however, remind staff that usual parking tariffs resume on Saturday, May 30, and that multi-storey facilities inside commercial towers are not included in the waiver. Hotels and serviced-apartment operators expect higher occupancy from Gulf tourists driving into Dubai, and have been advised to allocate additional valet staff. Logistics providers handling last-mile deliveries in retail zones can also schedule off-peak collections knowing curb space will be more readily available. Beyond Eid, the RTA says it will analyse real-time passenger data collected via Nol cards to assess whether permanent evening service extensions could support the city’s 24-hour tourism economy—an initiative closely watched by businesses lobbying for round-the-clock Metro operations before the 2030 World Expo anniversary celebrations.
Source: Gulf News
