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VIENNA

EXPLAINED: How does the Vienna parking system work?

The Austrian capital Vienna has a world-famous public transport system and really incentivises residents and visitors to use it. If you want to drive, you'll have to pay for public parking.

Published: 23 January 2023 16:16 CET
Updated: 21 February 2023 14:57 CET
EXPLAINED: How does the Vienna parking system work?
Cars parked in Vienna (Photo by Martin Fahlander on Unsplash)

Vienna’s public parking system may seem confusing until you get used to it, and it is not rare for recent residents or visitors to end up with a parking ticket. This is because the Austrian capital has a parking permit system that covers the whole city, meaning that if you want to park your car on a public street,  you will have to pay. 

Besides that, certain streets are off-limits for parking altogether or reserved for residents with a special permit. So, you need to watch out for road signs and always check twice before leaving your car – especially if you find a parking space near a busy tourist street. If it’s too good to be true, it may as well be. 

READ ALSO: How Vienna plans to expand its tram and park & ride systems for commuters

Short-term parking zones and residents’ parking permits are valid in Vienna’s districts, meaning that in the entire city, parking a car is only possible with either a resident’s parking permit (Parkpickerl) or a ticket (Parkschein) for the short-term zones.

Single-track vehicles like mopeds and motorcycles are exempt from the short-stay parking zone regulation.

Resident’s permit (Parkpickerl)

If you have your primary registered residence (Hauptwohnsitz) in Vienna, you will still be able to park in your home district for a low cost.

You need to apply for your resident’s parking permit (Parkpickerl), which you can do either online or by making an appointment at your municipal office (Magistrat). This might take around one week, according to city authorities.

The sticker costs €10 per month and will be the same in whichever district you live in. You can buy it for between four and 24 months at a time.

When you first apply, you also need to pay a one-off admin fee: of €35.70 if you register in person and €30.70 if you apply online using a HandySignatur. With a resident’s permit, there is no limit for how long you can park your car in your district, but you are also not allowed to park on shopping streets – even if you live nearby.

READ ALSO: Five underrated towns you can visit in a day from Vienna

Other permits (Parkschein)

If you park your car outside your district (or don’t have a Parkpickerl), then you need a specific ticket to park your vehicle on almost all Vienna streets.

However, you only have to pay from Monday to Friday (weekdays) from 9 am to 10 pm. So, parking is still free at night, on holidays and weekends. However, during weekdays and the specified times, you can only park your car for a maximum of two hours. 

Motorists can pay for their Parkschein with several tools. First, there is the classic paper Parkschein you buy at Tabak stores, gas stations, cigarette machines, post offices and several points of sale in Austria. Each colour allows you to park for a specific amount of time. For example, if you get a blue Parkschein,  you can park for 60 minutes.

Perhaps the easiest way to pay the fee is by using the official Handyparking app. You will need a smartphone to download and register for the app. You can find it at the App Store and Google Play.

The application is intuitive; you only need to top up your parking credit, select the city and licence plate number, and book duration in the app. Handyparking is also particularly useful as it shows a city map, so you can check the specific regulations (if any) of the place where you want to park.

READ ALSO: What you need to know about parking in Austria

Cars parked in Vienna (Photo by Anthony Fomin on Unsplash)

What are the prices?

From January 1st, 2023, prices were increased in Vienna. Now they are:

  • Parking time 15 minutes (parking ticket purple): Free of charge
  • 30 minutes (parking ticket red): €1.25 
  • 60 minutes (parking ticket blue): €2.50 
  • 90 minutes (parking ticket green): €3.75 
  • 120 minutes (parking ticket yellow): €5 

READ ALSO: Water, waste collection, parking: How Vienna will get more expensive in 2023

Exceptions

There are very few exceptions to the rules, including in some sparsely populated areas on the city’s outskirts where you do not have to pay for parking, or there are different time regulations. 

Some streets are reserved for district residents only, and traffic signs mark them. Businesses, social services and small transporters might also apply for different permits. Vehicles with a parking permit for the disabled are also exempt from the restrictions.

Vienna has several e-charging stations with strict rules on parking. The area in front of the stations is a no-parking zone except for electric vehicles during charging – once the car is charged, you must leave the electric charging zone with it. 

You can read more about the exceptions HERE. To read more about business streets, you can check HERE.

Useful vocabulary

Halten/anhalten – stopping

Parken – parking

Ladetätigkeit – loading

Halteverbote – stopping forbidden

Parkverbote – parking forbidden

Parkpickerl Zonen – residents’ parking zones

Behindertenparkplatz – disabled parking space

Einfahrten – driveways

Kurzparkzone – short term parking

Kurzparkgebühr – short term parking fee 

Abschleppung/Abschleppen – towing (of cars).

Private Parkplätze – private parking.

Anwohnerparken – Residents’ parking

Member comments

  1. A question: if I have been parked for the maximum two hours in one street, can I then drive to another street and park there for another two hours?

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VIENNA

Vienna Festival director Milo Rau hits back at anti-Semitism accusations

One of the latest events in Europe to be hit with accusations of anti-Semitism, the Vienna Festival kicks off Friday, with its new director, Milo Rau, urging that places of culture be kept free of the "antagonism" of the Israel-Hamas war while still tackling difficult issues.

Published: 17 May 2024 14:48 CEST
Vienna Festival director Milo Rau hits back at anti-Semitism accusations

As the conflict in Gaza sharply polarises opinion, “we must be inflexible” in defending the free exchange of ideas and opinions, the acclaimed Swiss director told AFP in an interview this week.

“I’m not going to take a step aside… If we let the antagonism of the war and of our society seep into our cultural and academic institutions, we will have completely lost,” said the 47-year-old, who will inaugurate the Wiener Festwochen, a festival of theatre, concerts, opera, film and lectures that runs until June 23rd in the Austrian capital and that has taken on a more political turn under his tenure.

The Swiss director has made his name as a provocateur, whether travelling to Moscow to stage a re-enactment of the trial of Russian protest punk band Pussy Riot, using children to play out the story of notorious Belgian paedophile Marc Dutroux, or trying to recruit Islamic State jihadists as actors.

Completely ridiculous 

The Vienna Festival has angered Austria’s conservative-led government — which is close to Israel — by inviting Greek former finance minister Yanis Varoufakis and French Nobel Prize winner for literature Annie Ernaux, both considered too critical of Israel.

A speech ahead of the festival on Judenplatz (Jews’ Square) by Israeli-German philosopher Omri Boehm — who has called for replacing Israel with a bi-national state for Arabs and Jews —  also made noise.

“Who will be left to invite?  Every day, there are around ten articles accusing us of being anti-Semitic, saying that our flag looks like the Palestinian flag, completely ridiculous things,” Rau said, as he worked from a giant bed which has been especially designed by art students and installed at the festival office.

Hamas’ bloody October 7th assault on southern Israel and the devastating Israeli response have stoked existing rancour over the Middle East conflict between two diametrically opposed camps in Europe.

In this climate, “listening to the other side is already treachery,” lamented the artistic director.

“Wars begin in this impossibility of listening, and I find it sad that we Europeans are repeating war at our level,” he said.

As head of also the NTGent theatre in the Belgian city of Ghent, he adds his time currently “is divided between a pro-Palestinian country and a pro-Israeli country,” or between “colonial guilt” in Belgium and “genocide guilt” in Austria, Adolf Hitler’s birthplace.

Institutional revolution

The “Free Republic of Vienna” will be proclaimed on Friday as this year’s Vienna Festival celebrates. according to Rau, “a second modernism, democratic, open to the world” in the city of the father of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud, and artist and symbolist master Gustav Klimt.

Some 50,000 people are expected to attend the opening ceremony on the square in front of Vienna’s majestic neo-Gothic town hall.

With Rau describing it as an “institutional revolution” and unlike any other festival in Europe, the republic has its own anthem, its own flag and a council made up of Viennese citizens, as well as honorary members, including Varoufakis and Ernaux, who will participate virtually in the debates.

The republic will also have show trials — with real lawyers, judges and politicians participating — on three weekends.

Though there won’t be any verdicts, Rau himself will be in the dock to embody “the elitist art system”, followed by the republic of Austria and finally by the anti-immigrant far-right Freedom Party (FPOe), which leads polls in the Alpine EU member ahead of September national elections.

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