If you park in the downtown area you could be paying a whole lot more for your spot. CTV News has learned that Impark, who manages parking for Redcliff Realty, will be raising rates by 40 per cent.

If you're paying $115 now to park in the lot on the south side of MTS centre, it's soon going to cost you $165. Three City Place parking lots will be affected by the increase.

A spokesperson for Impark says the reason for the hefty bump is in part an issue of the current prices being too low. The company says people have enjoyed lower than market prices for a long time.

To say people aren't happy about it, would be an understatement "I see no construction being done, or anything being fixed. So what the hell? Why's this costing us so much to park downtown," said one frustrated driver.

The answer, according to one downtown parking company, is simply a case of basic economics "Basically it's driven by supply and demand. If you've got more people needing parking, there's room to raise the rates," said Jim August from Forks North Portage Partnership.

That demand is only growing, question is will supply keep up or will the price be the only thing that's going up.

With a report from CTV's Jon Hendricks.