Cost of parking on the rise at northern Ontario hospital
CBC
Patients, visitors and staff at Sault Area Hospital will be dishing out more for parking in the next couple of weeks.
Beginning Dec. 31, the hospital will increase its standard exit fee from $6 to $7.50.
It’s the first time in 10 years that the hospital has adjusted its parking rates.
Between April 2024 and March 2025, Sault Area Hospital made more than $2.2 million in parking revenue. It netted just under $1.5 million after expenses, mostly from snowplowing.
In an email to CBC, Sault Area Hospital spokesperson Brandy Sharp Young said the increase in parking rates reflects “cumulative inflation” over the past decade.
“Ontario hospitals rely on parking fees as a revenue source to supplement government funding,” she wrote. “Parking revenues are used both to offset maintenance costs and to generate revenue, supporting vital community patient care programs.”
A provincial government policy called the Ontario Hospital Parking Directive requires hospitals to apply a standardized calculation to determine the parking rate they are allowed to charge.
Young said that for Sault Area Hospital, this calculation results in a rate that could be as high as $13 per exit. This amount varies for other hospitals depending on their parking options.
“Although the upcoming increase is 25 percent, it remains below both the maximum rate permitted by the directive and the cumulative inflation over the past ten-year period,” she wrote.
Meanwhile, 24-hour passes are also going up by $1.50 at the Sault hospital — from $10 to $11.50.
Five-day passes will increase by $3, 10-day passes will go up by $5 and 30-day per-year passes will cost an additional $10.
The monthly passes that allow for multiple visits and exits per day for 30 consecutive days are also rising — from $66.67 to $83.33. This is the pass that hospital staff also purchase.
Although the new per exit fee is $5.50 below the maximum allowable, not everyone is satisfied with the move — including Dennis Dinelle.
He’s the manager of Tracy’s Dream, a Sault Ste. Marie charity that covers the cost of parking at Sault Area Hospital for hundreds of cancer patients each year.
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