City Council

CITY OF FREDERICKSBURG, VIRGINIA HON. MARY KATHERINE GREENLAW, MAYOR HON. WILLIAM C. WITHERS, JR., VICE -MAYOR, WARD TWO CITY COUNCIL HON. KERRY P. DEVINE, AT-LARGE HON. MATTHEW J. KELLY, AT-LARGE HON. BRADFORD C. ELLIS, WARD ONE HON. DR. TIMOTHY P. DUFFY, WARD THREE Council Chambers, 715 Princess Anne Street HON. CHARLIE L. FRYE, JR., WARD FOUR Fredericksburg, Virginia 22401 Council Work Session June 20, 2017 Parking Action Plan: Staff Recommendations The Council of the City of Fredericksburg, Virginia held a work session on Tuesday, June 20, 2017, beginning at 6:00 p.m. in the Executive Plaza, Third Floor Training Room. Council Present. Mayor Mary Katherine Greenlaw, Presiding. Vice-Mayor William C. Withers, Jr., Councilors Kerry P. Devine, Timothy P. Duffy, Bradford C. Ellis, Charlie L. Frye, Jr. and Matthew J. Kelly. Also Present. City Manager Timothy J. Baroody, Assistant City Manager Mark Whitley, Assistant City Manager Doug Fawcett, City Attorney Kathleen Dooley, Transportation Administrator Erik Nelson, Public Works Director David King and Clerk of Council Tonya B. Lacey. Others Present. Parking Taskforce Members Joe Wilson, Economic Development Authority Representative, D.D. Lecky, Main Street Representative and Rick Pearce, University of Mary Washington Representative. Parking Action Plan: Staff Recommendations. City Manager Baroody stated that the Taskforce had met six times as a group, they have held four public meetings and there were 782 respondents to the parking survey. He said they landed on a draft recommendation and they presented Council with the next steps. Assistant City Manager Fawcett presented a PowerPoint presentation. The presentation covered the purpose of the presentation, parking management action plan, parking paradigms, conclusions in the plan, survey results, how to address the situation, specific short term recommendations and mid-term recommendations. (See attachment for more information). Councilor Devine asked how would the City direct people to the parking areas that are available now. Councilor Duffy suggested improved signage and an improved webpage. He said Apps and third parties were also great ways to let people know. Councilor Ellis said in the long term 1 an App would be the way to go but in the short term signage was needed. Councilor Ellis also stated that parking needed to be communicated to jurors or the City should provide them with parking passes. Mr. Fawcett agreed that those serving jury duty could be issued parking passes by the sheriff’s office for parking in the garage. He said they plan to speak to the Sheriff’s office about options in the near future. Councilor Ellis also asked how handicapped parking signs were managed and Mr. Fawcett explained that they send letters out annually and the applicant must prove they still live there and qualify for the space. Councilor Frye said handicapped parking on the corners was difficult because it was hard to maneuver on the corner and he also suggested having a designated area for motorcycles to park in the downtown. Mr. Fawcett explained that the positive to having the handicapped parking on the corners was that the handicap ramps were close by, otherwise they would have to be pushed in the street to get to the ramp. Mr. Fawcett said they contact the disability Resource Center whenever they have questions regarding handicapped parking. Councilor Devine said when the paid parking gets rolled out she wanted to make sure the paid parking does not seem punitive. She said she wanted to be sure everyone understood why the City was going that route. She said she would like to see free parking during events and during the holiday season. Mr. Fawcett explained a revelation they had during the study which they realized the City did not charge for the prime parking but it charged for the garage parking. He said they would be looking into this more. Councilor Devine suggested putting up a banner on the garage advertising the first three hours for free “Free Three”. Mr. Baroody said he was going to work on making parking more visible on the internet because currently it does not show parking when you do a google search. He also noted that he and Mr. Fawcett would be traveling to Charlottesville to meet with them on their parking because they were about a year head of the City in a similar process for moving to paid parking. Councilor Duffy asked staff to discuss the financial cost for parking and whether there would be work for the Taskforce to continue working. Mr. Fawcett discussed the financial costs involved with parking and he noted that there was no such thing as free parking, but complimentary parking because someone was paying for the parking. He said paid parking should be discussed in high demand areas at high demand times. Mr. Fawcett agreed that there should be a parking fund and the revenues from parking would go into the fund and this could be used to maintain the parking. Mr. Fawcett also said there was plenty of work for the Taskforce to continue working and 2 meeting regularly. Mr. Baroody agreed and said they should meet quarterly to hear issues and progress. Councilor Kelly asked whether the two hour parking limit was enough time for someone to go downtown, shop and eat. He suggested that the two hour parking be looked at more closely. He also questioned where the employees were going to park once the two hour parking hours were changed to 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Councilor Kelly also expressed his concerns with putting two hour parking around the college and he wanted to have talks about the new parking deck that the University was proposing to build. He said he would like to know the future development plans of the University. Councilor Kelly suggest making the parking deck free or maybe do a pilot program and make it free on the weekends. Mr. Baroody said the City plans to use the parking deck for now as a solution because it was not being used to full capacity and with the implementation of the parking plan suggestions, things should get better. Mayor Greenlaw agreed that the two hour parking needed to be increased because nothing could be done in two hours. Mr. Fawcett said Council needed to resolve the two hour parking issue and he asked the Council to use extreme caution when considering the increase to four hour parking. He said he came up with one pro and that was that people could park longer and spend more money. He said if the parking limit was going to be increased he suggested doing it concurrently with the paid parking. Councilor Duffy understood the desire to increase the parking limit to four hours but after working with the consultants they believe that would be problematic. There were also concerns from some of the merchants who expressed concerns that a car could be parked in front of their shop for four hours limiting the patronage to their shop. He said people cannot expect to park in front of their destination. Councilor Ellis discussed how Greenville, NC handled their projects. He said they do not allow a project unless parking was a provided or funding is involved for parking. He thought this was a good way to handle the parking issues in the City. Mr. Fawcett reminded Council of the “fee in lieu of”. Councilor Kelly suggested maybe leaving two hour on Caroline and Princess Anne Streets and maybe do longer on the side streets. He also addressed the issue that the University did not have to provide parking when they add additions and he said that needed to be addressed with the Legislature. 3  Mr. Baroody said the university’s parking was at 80 percent and they were willing to try and get the other 20 percent to use the parking on campus. Ms. Lecky addressed concerns from Main Street and said they have had a lot of conversations with members of Main Street. She said the concerns vary, some were in favor of metered parking and others not as much. She said what needed to be done was addressing the concerns as they are right now by making sure there was good signage showing the parking. The three biggest concerns were the lack of parking signage, lack of information and the lack of consistency between parking areas. Ms. Lecky said they were highly in favor of trolley transportation from outside lots and transportation that would shuttle people in from various areas to make it a fun experience. Many of the businesses said they would pay for it or bare some of the cost for the service. Ms. Lecky said there must be good lighting as well as good signage. She felt if the City showed they were capable of doing these things, they may buy into the paid parking. Councilor Kelly asked Ms. Lecky of they could survey the merchants to get a feel on what they would like to have happen in downtown. She said she could run it by the Board but she said the parking survey was passed out to the merchants by Main Street and many people do not like to fill out surveys. She said in many of her conversations the concern of safety came up a lot and these concerns would need to be addressed. Councilor Frye said the shuttle concept would be a great idea and a way to bring more people into the City. Mr. Fawcett said establishing a shuttle was a long term Council goal and they were working on it but he cautioned that there was a limit to what extent FRED Transit could run because of federal funding. Mr. Baroody stated that maybe it could be a van and not a FRED bus but they would look at all the options. Councilor Devine noted that the easier it is for people they would use it. Councilor Devine asked if there was a concern with quick turnover of parking in the downtown and Ms. Lecky said they had not heard any concerns with quick turnover but she said they did not want to cater to people who want to turnover quickly because downtown was a strolling environment. Mr. Nelson said they learned from the consultant that parking should be looked at as a system on street and off street. He said parking needed to be provided for those visiting long term and premium spaces were premium spaces. Sargent Crystal Jones asked a few questions related to signage and she addressed concerns on the enforcement side because of the way some of the signs are worded. She also asked that the signage in the City’s VRE lot be made clearer for enforcement. 4  Mr. Baroody asked if Council was in general consensus and he asked could he move forward and Council agreed. Adjournment. There being no further business to come before the Council at this time. Mayor Greenlaw declared the session officially adjourned at 7:50 p.m. _ _Tonya B. Lacey ____ Tonya B. Lacey, CMC Clerk of Council City of Fredericksburg 5