Find solutions to parking problems

By Bill Bauer

The City has already placed parking restrictions on two-thirds of the City Streets. The resultant mess means less parking available. Now, the City wants to allow employee and commercial parking back into residential parking zones as a "quick fix" for years of bad planning.

Over the last two decades, these restrictions expanded to areas adjacent to major north/south and east west corridors. the beach areas, Ocean Park, mid-cities area near the hopsitals and even to the tony section of multi-million dollar homes in the far northeast corner of the City. More recently approved parking zones now allow limted time for public parking. Older areas are still fully restricted.

As a result, public parking for shoppers and employees of businesses dried up while restricted streets were empty most of the day.

The purpose of restricted parking zones is to prevent the encroachment of commerical or business parking into a residential neighborhood. So, the city realizing that their poor planning has caught up with them, now proposes to sell permits to businesses and their employees to allow them to park in residential neighborhoods, once again. Nothing demonstrates how schizophrenic City planning is like the parking solutions promulgated over the last twenty years.

I will seek new and creative solutions ot parking problems without allowing residential streets to become occupied iwth commerical and empoloyee parking.