I understand that Councillor Guthrie recently alluded to un-named merchants who claimed to be in favour of returning parking meters to downtown Guelph. But what might they have been in favour of – or against? Were they in favour of a special tax on downtown users, or just irritated by the vanishing short-term (and long-term) parking inventory?
As a longtime merchant, I can assure you that return to parking meters downtown would be as wise (and surprising) as a similar policy change at Stone Road Mall. If such a policy makes sense for downtown, certainly a similar policy would work for every mall in the city. So why no uptake by the private sector? Are the malls missing a revenue or marketing opportunity?
Council’s adoption of 2 hour free parking downtown was a long overdue (should have been done in the 70’s when Stone Road Mall opened) package that had two components: 2 hour free parking for downtown users and sensible enforcement to prevent abuse by city staff and merchants. The 2 hour free has been applauded by users (city-wide surveys conducted by the city can attest to this), but the enforcement part of the plan has been _very_ poorly implemented up until the recent purchase of the high tech enforcement car for $70,000. In the interim, enforcement dropped dramatically and we saw implementation of half of the plan. Was the plan bad (remove disincentives for downtown users), or the implementation of the plan (sensible enforcement)?
While there is no doubt that we have seen pressure on parking inventory due to poor enforcement, we have also seen erosion of inventory by construction, the re-design of a number of streets, and the incursion of the transit transfer station; and these shortcomings have been compounded by the postponement of the Wilson Street parkade construction due to diversion of capital funding.
Parking is _not_ a standalone issue. It is an essential component of economic development infrastructure. This is as true in mall development as it is in a downtown. Can anyone imagine a Walmart or Home Depot or any other mall in the city with insufficient parking – or meters in their parking lots?
Turning downtown into a special “parking taxation zone” would seem to be at odds with support for downtown economic development initiatives in the context of Ontario’s “places to grow” legislation. Instead of taxing downtown users, the city should get on with the job of providing parking infrastructure to support economic development. DM