St. Joseph City Commissioners have heard the recommendations for downtown parking from the consulting firm they hired to study the issue.
At a Wednesday study session, Eric Haggett with Walker Consulting said the recommendation is for paid parking to be implemented downtown. He said the consulting firm’s paid parking proposal is only for May 1 through September 30.
“In the off-season, we’re still recommending free parking all across downtown with some minor adjustments to the time limits and the hours of enforcement just to create some consistency,” Haggett said.
Also, parking would still be free east of Main Street. Haggett said the main problem with parking in the summer is west of Main, often caused by beachgoers who park in downtown St. Joe and then walk down below the bluff for the day.
There would be a $2 per hour parking fee on streets west of Main Street and $1 an hour in parking lots west of Main.
Walker Consultants suggested that if the plan is adopted, it should be at the start of a summer, with preparations expected to take around 18 weeks. The upfront cost to the city would be about $541,000 due to the purchase of an estimated 41 paystations, signage, and enforcement.
Moving forward, the cost per year to have paid parking would be an estimated $130,000, while the revenues would be an estimated $830,000. Commissioner Michael Sarola said the good thing about that is most of the revenue would be paid by visitors, and not so much by residents.
Commissioners had no decision to make Wednesday as it was just a study session. However, they were receptive to Walker’s suggestions.
