Parking time limits or meters coming to downtown Salem?

According to Salem city councilor Chuck Bennett, who represents the downtown area, City officials are looking at replacing the current free unlimited parking policy with "time-limited" parking.

This could mean several things. Going back to a two-hour limit. Or installing parking meters, the City's goal before 9,000 signatures on a citizen initiative petition to ban meters and time limits dashed that dream.

Bennett emailed me a response after he'd gotten my message asking if a report was true that he'd talked at a neighborhood association meeting about the council moving forward with parking meters again.

No, I said the city is in the process of replacing parking meters in the Capitol Mall area with an updated system and will be looking at changing the current 24/7 free parking system downtown back to one that is time limited.

The word "back" implies a return to two-hour limits downtown with no parking meters. However, other people have told me that plans are being laid to resurrect the parking meter proposal that met a well-deserved demise last fall.

It wasn't voters who said "no way" to downtown parking meters. The Salem City Council decided to adopt the language of the citizen initiative, which otherwise would have been voted on in last May's primary election. 

Sponsors of the initiative wanted to have a city-wide debate prior to the election about the pros and cons of parking meters. The fear was that Mayor Peterson and the eight city councilors weren't really in favor of banning meters and time limits; they just were playing a political game in approving the initiative so it could be undermined sooner rather than later.

Which, sadly, does seem to have happened. 

Regardless, City officials now own the parking policy that they voted in on their own. If they didn't want meters and time-limits banned, they shouldn't have put that language into Salem's parking ordinance.

So it was crazy for Councilor Bennett to refer at the neighborhood association meeting to "the Carole Smith Project" being over.

Yes, Carole Smith was a prime mover behind the initiative drive. And if the initiative had been passed by voters, then arguably it would be accurate to say that she (along with others) brought the parking meter ban and unlimited onstreet parking into being.

But since the Mayor and city councilors decided to bypass voters and implement these parking policies on their own, they now are the ones who own those policies.

I haven't had any trouble parking downtown since unlimited parking went into effect. I'm not aware of any statistical evidence showing that it is more difficult for people to park downtown now. All we have, so far as I know, is anecdotes about increased parking problems -- which aren't reliable.

So what City officials need to do is what they didn't do before: involve a broad cross-section of the public in a open-minded discussion of downtown parking policies. Downtown business owners. Frequent visitors to downtown. Downtown residents. Everybody.

Unfortunately, the current crop of folks at City Hall are terrible at this -- collaborating in an honest, open, transparent, trusting manner with a diverse group of "stakeholders." They much prefer top-down decision-making, where the Power Structure tries to sell a pre-determined course of action to the public.

This didn't work very well before.

As evidenced by citizen uprisings to (1) a proposed takeover of part of Riverfront Park for a developer's private access road; (2) a notion to convert the Salem Public Library to a police facility; (3) charging a regressive streetlight tax; (4) building an unneeded, unwanted, and unpaid for $425 million third bridge. And, of course, (5) putting in downtown parking meters.

In another blog post I'll discuss how wiser and more functional city governments elsewhere have worked closely and collaboratively with downtown business owners to make parking meters a success. 

The key, as laid out by noted parking expert Donald Shoup, is to make sure that every penny of parking  meter revenue is used to make a downtown area more attractive to visitors. Not, repeat not, to pad City coffers or pay for parking garages.

Rather, Shoup says:

Consider an older business district where most stores have no off-street parking, and vacant curb spaces are hard to find. Cruising for free curb parking congests the streets, and everyone complains about a parking shortage.

Charging market-rate prices for curb parking would increase turnover, and reduce traffic congestion. The convenience of a few vacancies would attract customers who are willing to pay for parking if they don't have to spend time hunting for it. Nevertheless, merchants fear that charging for parking would keep customers away.

Suppose in this case the city creates a "parking benefit district" in which all the meter revenue is spent to pay for public amenities that can attract customers, such as cleaning the sidewalks, planting street trees, improving store facades, putting the overhead utility wires underground, and ensuring public safety. 

The meter revenue will help make the business district a place where people want to be, rather than merely a place where they can park free. Spending the meter revenue to improve the area where it is collected can convince merchants and property owners to buy into the idea of market-priced curb parking.

This could work in Salem. But probably not until we have new leadership in City Hall. (See my blog post, "Don't trust City of Salem to manage downtown parking.")

There isn't much chance that the current Mayor, City Manager, and city councilors understand what it takes to form a collaborative working relationship with all of the stakeholders who would have to buy in to a downtown parking meter policy as described by Shoup.

Given the "my way or the highway" top-down bureaucratic attitude in evidence at City Hall, downtown business owners and others are justified in saying No! to parking meters, and possibly even parking time limits -- since the City sees a two-hour limit more as a way to generate revenue through parking tickets, than as a way to vitalize downtown.

Sadly, Salem is a city of contention, not collaboration. The fault lies with City officials. Until they see the collaborative light, downtown parking policies likely are doomed to remain a source of conflct.

Comments

[Jim Scheppke]

Great post Brian. I agree. I could be for downtown meters if it were done right and were part of a comprehensive strategy to make downtown the prime business district and tourist destination of Salem.

The fact that all the new businesses have been going in on S. Commercial (e.g., Trader Joes, Five Guys, Panera Bread, etc.) shows a real failure of city leadership. If we had the right parking policies those businesses might have gone in downtown. That would have been great! The City also should have leaned hard on the the Social Security Administration to locate downtown instead of on McGilchrist. Downtown is really being neglected under the current City leadership.

[Chuck Bennett]

Parking in downtown Salem whether free and unlimited, with meters (as it was at one time), paid for with a tax on businesses or for limited durations has been an issue for over 40 years. To suggest that this issue doesn't get enough public comment would be to overlook the barrels of ink and gigabytes of email that surround the topic every time it is raised.
Jim Scheppke's comments are correct to a point. There are a variety of issues that businesses consider when locating including localized demographics, appropriateness of available business space, traffic patterns, parking, rent structures and the list goes on. In each case, the city has a role that it fulfills but not every issue involved in these decisions can be determined by government action. The city, through the Urban Renewal District, has invested millions of dollars in revitalization efforts including parking garages. But the government can't do this alone. It needs an engaged, progressive private sector that is willing to join in this investment and vision of a vibrant and economically vital area. Fortunately we have seen outstanding examples of that spirit downtown and when appropriate we have seen the kind of public/private partnerships needed to move us forward.
At the same time, the Salem community has continued to see its downtown as its central commercial district. Just look at Eugene if you want to see what can go wrong in a core area.
Of course we're not going to win them all for a variety of reasons. I'm not sure the ones Jim mentions represent the losses he laments when I seen Pennys, Macys, Nordstrums, Ross, Kohls and other department stores continue their commitment to downtown. As a regular downtown customer, I'm thrilled to visit any one of our downtown restaurants, boutique stores or coffee shops. I can't make it through the week without a visit to Book Bin and there isn't a day I don't marvel at the rejuvenation of the Grand. Wednesdays is a farmer's market and during the summer it seems a weekly big event at Riverfront Park. I can now walk from downtown to West Salem away from traffic and will soon be able to walk to Roth's if I want to. Next year I can leave Cascade Bakery and take my lunch to Minto-Brown Island Park without hopping in my car. There is substantial and growing opportunities to live downtown if I want to give up my car completely.
I guess my point is that it's easy to point out the exceptions to the rule but for my money, Salem downtown has done nothing but get better since I moved here in 1966. As the city councilor for this area, I work daily to do my part to see that happen. And I think it would be news to all the businesses downtown and the investors building them that we should measure our success by where Five Guys choose to locate.

[Curt Fisher]

Chuck,

You are the one citing the exceptions to the rule. The fact is the strip malls, surface parking lots and overbuilt arterials are the rule in Salem. You proved that again last night. Very few people have a grocery within walking distance and if they do, its usually a pretty miserable experience. You are right that plenty of cities in Oregon have made similar mistakes to Salem. The differance is that most of them have acted boldly and swiftly to correct those mistakes and have succeeded in accomplishing many things in the area of urban design and livablility that Salem has failed to do (though it seems too often the city isn't even trying). You are also right that a progressive private sector is a key ingredient. That doesn't mean the city needs to put so much effort into pandering to the regressive crop of private sector developers that are drawn to Salem. What I have noticed in the short time that I have lived here is that the young families that we have met that do have progressive values do not see a future in Salem for themselves or their families, even when they do have jobs here. They have left for greener pastures in Portland, Corvallis, McMinnvillle, Eugene, Seattle, Boise, etc.... They are willing to pay higher taxes and endure long commutes so they don't have to live in Salem. When Holiday Retirement left they were very upfront about the fact there was no reason for them to be here because their employees didn't even live here.

[Brian Hines]

Curt, nicely put. I often hear the same thing: people are pleased to work in Salem and take their paycheck back to Portland or wherever they want to live and raise a family.

Our City officials, like Bennett, have an outmoded view of economic development. They don't realize that quality of life is the driver now. Younger people aren't nearly as willing to live in a crappy place just to have a job.

Salem is way behind the times, the cutting edge -- heck, any sort of edge. Our city council's idea of improving transportation options is to build a $425 million third bridge rather than spend a few million on bike lanes.

As we saw at the last council meeting, City leaders consider that demolishing a historic building, Howard Hall, is justified so Salem Hospital can have 87 extra parking spaces. This sort of stuff turns off potential businesses and people who have a choice about where to relocate.

The only reason to choose Salem is that because this is such an undesirable place to live and start a business, it is cheaper to buy a house or lease a space here. Such is my understanding, at least.

So our lack of "coolness" makes Salem attractive to those who don't care about living in an attractive town.