“To change the perception of parking availability and value among Jacksonville residents, Downtown stakeholders and potential employers so that parking is no longer cited as a primary reason not to visit, lease or do business Downtown.”
That’s the goal of a new City parking initiative and the foundation of new legislation being drafted for presentation to the City Council.
“There is plenty of parking. The spaces are there. It’s not a supply problem, it’s a perception problem,” said City Public Parking Officer Jack Shad.
Shad was the presenter Monday at a meeting hosted by Downtown Vision Inc. to allow Downtown business and property owners and managers to voice their concerns about parking issues.
Shad said there are 1,650 metered parking spaces Downtown. According to the 2011 “State of Downtown” progress report from the City Office of Economic Development and DVI, there are 15,365 parking spaces in surface lots and garages in the central business district and 26,487 spaces in peripheral lots outside the central core. That’s a total of 43,502 parking spaces.
Shad presented a “Downtown Parking Perception Action Plan” that lists short-term and long-term objectives.
Objectives include ensuring that adequate on-street parking is available for short-term users, making visitors to Downtown more comfortable about using parking meters and avoiding citations, giving Downtown merchants tools to help their customers find parking and responding to market demands for affordable parking options for Downtown employees.
The short-term measures, which Shad said could be implemented without additional funding, include waiving the fine for parking overtime at a meter if a purchase is made at a Downtown business, adjusting rates at meters to make it more expensive to park on the street at certain times of the day and allowing perpendicular on-street parking for motorcycles and scooters to create more spaces.
Long-term methods would likely require dedicated funding not currently appropriated, Shad said. Those include offering all-day parking at the Osborn Center and Kings Avenue parking garage, making the Skyway an option; marking meters with time zones and rate information visible from inside a vehicle; and ensuring that City vehicles are not parked at meters for long periods of time.
Shad said one change that has already been made is reducing the number of parking tickets issued for overtime parking.
The City has “made a conscious decision to go lighter on enforcement than we have in the past. Getting a parking ticket is a deterrent to coming Downtown,” said Shad.
Council member Don Redman, whose district includes Downtown, and Council president Bill Bishop are sponsoring legislation that would change how the City conducts its parking business.
The proposed ordinance will seek to clarify the relationship between time zones and meter zones. For example, the time limitation in a certain area might be longer than the maximum time limit on a meter. In that case, a vehicle could legally remain at a meter for up to the time-zone limit if the driver inserted more coins in the meter to extend the parking time.
The legislation, as drafted, also would clarify that vehicles with disabled parking permits or tags are not exempt from time limits, but that vehicles with disabled veteran tags are exempt from time limits.
“The whole idea is to encourage people to come Downtown,” said Redman.
Shad said another program being considered is modeled after a parking policy in St. Petersburg, whereby if a motorist is issued a citation for overtime parking on a meter, the fine may be waived one time when the offender presents a sales receipt from a business in the central shopping district.
Roy Thomas, owner of Jacobs Jewelers, said it is his policy to pay the fine for any customer who shops at the store and is issued a parking ticket.
Shad said more public meetings are planned to allow stakeholders and Downtown parking users to express their opinions.
@drmaxdowntown
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