Holiday parking plan will include University Ave.
By Nathan R. Huff
Much to the chagrin of University Avenue residents, the town council agreed at its Oct. 16 meeting to open the street to two-hour parking on a temporary basis. At the same time, the council approved a two-hour limit on the portions of Tait and Wilder avenues hardest hit by last year's holiday parking crunch.
The decisions were part of the much larger downtown holiday parking program, a hodge-podge of measures designed to avoid repeating the parking free-for-all that characterized the 1999 holiday season.
The council had avoided making a decision on the University and Tait avenues issue, saying it wanted to solicit more neighborhood and staff input. Staff came forward on Oct. 16, with the same recommendation that was on previous reports--open the street for limited public parking.
Residents stuck by their guns, citing issues of safety, convenience and the town's own decision to create 24-hour, permit-only parking as a mitigation measure for the reopening of Old Town.
"There appears to be very little regard to what lifting the 24-hour ban on parking will do to our lives," University Avenue resident Larry Edgar told the council. He added that he was troubled by the staff report's language, which states that having a two-hour limit will increase turnover, which "should increase the chances of a resident finding an available on-street space."
But council members, while favoring different hours of enforcement, were unanimous in support of opening up University Avenue. Saying it was a "matter of equity" with the other downtown neighborhoods, the council agreed to two-hour parking, enforced 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. through Dec. 26. On the plus side for University Avenue residents, the council decided against the town traffic engineer's recommendation and approved a stop sign at the intersection of Royce and University.
Tait and Wilder Avenue residents came out of the meeting happier than their University Avenue compatriots, armed with a temporary two-hour parking limit on portions of both streets. The areas affected are already in the preferential parking area, meaning residents have exclusive parking rights between 6:30 p.m. and 2 a.m.. Last year, however, three-hour restrictions in the town's parking lots forced much of the long-term parking into these areas of the Almond Grove neighborhood.
Other Parking News
* The council directed town staff to work with St. Mary's representative Phil Michichi, following Michichi's offer to open up the church/school parking lot--under a number of conditions--for limited public use. Staff pledged to work with the Catholic school, but stated that time was running out to implement something for this holiday season.
* The council settled on a pared-down version of the holiday shuttle. The original proposal called for two shuttles, running an extensive downtown loop, but council members objected to the cost of the service. A locally owned shuttle company will now run one 27-person shuttle on a route going from Miles Avenue to University Avenue, south to Main Street, west to North Santa Cruz Avenue, north to Royce Street, back to University, and on down to the Miles Avenue lot. The shuttle will cost the town $40,000.The shuttle will run from Nov. 1 to Dec. 24.
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