PARKING LOT AND METER RATE PROPOSAL

Recommendation:

That the City Council review each rate and parking program and provide direction to staff.

Background:

The opening of the parking structure provides an opportunity to adjust the parking rate and other parking programs. The parking rate and programs have been in operation without much change since 1985. During this time, the parking lots have charged more than the parking meters on the streets. The general impact of this is that the streets fill first and the lost last because of the higher rates. The proposal that follows is intended to change that so that the lots will be the first place that visitors and customers will park. In addition, the proposal recommends a higher monthly rate and perhaps a limit on the number issued, a flat fee for peak nighttime use. It is also recommended that rates of the meters be changed as part of this overall program review.

It is important to keep in mind that we do have a partner in the parking structure and the arrangement with the County for a 50/50 split of net revenue. The agreement with the County anticipated a 50¢ per hour rate as a floor. This proposal meets the intent of the agreement and a copy has been provided to them for their review.

The new parking lot operator, Parking Concepts, is working on a management basis rather than a revenue contract. This arrangement provides more direct control and will allow us to deal with any problems and make changes without going through a contract change. As a result, we can try things much easier than we ever could before.

The purpose of the overall parking program is to ensure that the users of the facilities are paying the costs of operating and providing some funds to build more parking in the long run. The rate proposal is designed to be fair and accomplish the overall purpose of, in the long run, providing more parking.

Proposed parking program rates:

Basic Off-street Rate

50¢ per hour - $8 maximum

This will cover the new structure and Lot A. Lot B will be set up with meters. Present rates in Lot A are $2.50 per hour summer and $1.50 per hour winter

Basic On-street Rate

75¢ per hour

Meters operate 10:00am to 10:00pm. This would cover both yellow and silver meters and should encourage use of the off-street parking.

Peak Evening Flat Rate

$4.00 per entry.

This will allow the operator to collect upon entry and eliminate the often long lines leaving the lots after the clubs close. This would be flexible and would probably be used on Thursday, Friday and Saturday evenings.

Monthly Permits

$50.00 per month

Present rate is $30.00 per month. This rate is for businesses located in the area. This program has been available for years. The last time the rate was changed was in 1985. In order to ensure that there was parking during the structure construction period, merchants were limited to one per business. In the past, we have sold up to 120 permits per month. It is proposed that all the monthly permits, except the parking structure retail, be honored at Lot A only. This would leave the structure available for customers. This will help in marketing the parking structure as a destination.

Validation Program Rate

50¢ per hour

The present validation program offers a 20¢ per hour rate which has been used for over 10 years. The present program limited validation to three hours. The funds lost of the validation program were made up on the very high lot rates. With much lower lot rates this may not be as important, however, it will be available if the merchants would like to use it as a business decision.

Employee Parking Permits

$60 per year

These permits have been a tradition for years. The overall goal of the parking program could be to phase these out once an alternative employee parking area is developed. A Shuttle Program for a remote lot would also work. I believe that we can work on improving this program along with the business owners. It might be a good idea to consider issuing these on a semi-annual basis, which might help curb any abuse.

Coastal Daily Permit

$6.00 per day

The City makes the daily permit available as a condition of approval for the Preferential Parking Program.

This proposal generally follows the recommendations that were suggested by Walker and Associates in their study performed for us in 1996. We have, over the last two years, greatly simplified the parking programs and the above proposals would complete the task. Once the rates are set, we will be able to work with the merchants on a number of promotions and incentives to attract people to the parking structure.

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