Details about changes being proposed for the city of St. Joseph’s paid parking plan for this summer are now being shared with the public.
After a rocky rollout to the downtown paid parking program last year and its suspension, it was back to the drawing board for city staff and the parking subgroup, which met with business owners and residents to gather feedback.
Speaking at the first of four public information sessions on the plan Tuesday, Communications Director Kayla Griffith told us the new plan is highly scaled back.
“All paid parking is going to be on street now and we’re going from inclusive of lots, more than 800 spaces down to 175 only,” Griffith said. “So I think people will be really happy with that.”
If the plan is adopted by city commissioners, Griffith said there will be no paid parking in lots. Chris Lannert of the DDA and the parking subgroup says the new plan came out of much discussion.
“We’re really pleased with what we’re presenting and we hope we get positive feedback over the next four days so we can recommend it to the Commission and they’ll be able to take action on it,” Lannert said.
We asked City Manager Emily Hackworth if having so many fewer paid spaces will drastically reduce the revenue generated by the parking program, and she said the program was never about revenue. It was about getting traffic to move more smoothly downtown. As for the pay stations installed all over the downtown, she said they won’t go to waste.
“One of the things we heard was that we didn’t have enough machines,” Hackworth said. “So the machines will actually just be reallocated to this area where there will continue to be paid parking so that we will have more machines more conveniently located.”
Mayor Brook Thomas said she’s looking forward to learning more from the subgroup and residents. She wants people to come out in person to the information sessions to share their thoughts.
“We can’t listen to any of the feedback that is put out on social medias that aren’t directly connected to the city,” Thomas said. “So that’s why it’s important to come to open houses and public comment and anything that’s directly communicating with the city government because otherwise we don’t know. We can’t scroll all the different social media outlets. So if you come here in person, tell us your opinion, we’re going to listen.”
Tuesday’s session was intended for business owners, and there will be one more for them on Wednesday, February 4 from 2 to 4 p.m. There will be two sessions for residents next week. They’ll be from 5 to 7 p.m. Monday and Tuesday.
The plan, as it’s currently proposed, is to have paid parking from Memorial Day through Labor Day. If all goes well with the information sessions, the parking subgroup could submit its recommendations to city commissioners in the late winter.