Title
Agenda Item:
Parking Strategic Plan
Body
Issue:
Council requested an update on downtown parking and an opportunity to review and discuss strategies.
Committee Recommendation:
General Government Committee considered recommendations from the Parking and Business Improvement Area’s (PBIA) Parking Advisory Committee at their June 19, 2012 meeting regarding “a more friendly approach to downtown parking”. The PBIA’s recommendations are included as Attachment 3.
City Manager’s Recommendation:
Provide feedback and direction regarding parking program operations, potential amendments to the parking ordinance and next steps for the parking program.
Staff Contact:
Keith Stahley, Community Planning and Development Director, 360.753.8227
Karen Herald, Business Manager, 360.753.8277
Background and Analysis:
The 2009 Parking Strategic Plan was developed to set the foundation for the City to create an extraordinary parking system for our downtown community, the Vision for which is:
· A ticket-free experience
· Easy to access
· Convenient for both short- and long-term users
· Intuitive
· Adaptable
· Financially sound
The intent is to provide a parking system in the downtown retail core that is primarily available for retail users and operated efficiently with neither too many nor too few parking stalls available at any one time. According to Dr. Donald Shoupe (see Attachment 1) in his update to the High Cost of Free Parking, and Todd Litman (Attachment 2) in his work for the Victory Transport Policy Institute, “Experts recommend setting prices to maintain 85-90% occupancy rates; this is called performance-based or responsive pricing (Shoup 2005).” Olympia manages its parking system towards this objective. Occupancy rates in downtown often exceed 85% in the downtown core indicating that patrons are still fully utilizing available spaces in the retail core.
Three and nine hour meters are managed to provide longer term and less frequent turnover stalls outside the down...
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