Parking: Our Lifeblood
First - the 85% RULE
The 85% Rule is the rule of thumb used by parking professionals as a point at which it is recommended a downtown should begin to discuss parking strategies to prevent future congestion. Which parking strategies and how advanced the parking congestion should be before those strategies are implemented, should be agreed upon by the downtown community.
The book "Parking Management Best Practices" states the following warning regarding the 85% Rule: Standards are often based on the 85th percentile demand curve resulting in excessive supply under most circumstances. Most parking demand studies are performed at single-use, suburban sites. The resulting standards tend to be excessive for other conditions (such as downtowns).
As you can see, the parking district never reached the 85% capacity. If the statistic is correct, then 2 hour parking limits were never needed as a parking management tool. Instead the city implemented 2 hour limits as a revenue tool to collect parking ticket fines. We believe that this has caused several businesses to leave downtown and it continues to damage several other businesses. We believe that there needs to be a HONEST discussion about 2 hour parking and if the downtown community is unhappy, the parking strategy needs to be amended.
Some possible outcomes might be:
1. Eliminate 2 hour limits and INCREASE enforcement to prevent employees, volunteers and other prohibited parties from illegally parking on-street.
2. Expand the 2 hour limit to 3 or 4 hours.
3. Develop different time limits in different areas of downtown based on area parking demand.
4. Install parking meters.
