The Lexington and Fayette County Parking Authority recently unveiled LEXPARK, a unified parking program that has begun the first phase of its management operations with the enforcement of parking limits in the city's 1,100 metered spaces in the downtown area.
In an interview that can be heard by clicking on the Podcast below, Parking Authority executive director Gary Means talked about this and other new parking initiatives coming soon in downtown Lexington.
The following are excerpts from the conversation with Business Lexington's Tom Martin:
What's coming in the near future?
GM: The most visible thing that we're excited about rolling out is 5 full-time enforcement ambassadors that we're going to call "Outriders." Yes, part of their job is to write tickets, but what we're really trying to do is put a friendly face on this by having maps and information about restaurants and things like that. They will be active out on the street, and they're going to be riding an electric, three-wheeled vehicle called a chariot, made by a company called American Chariots. I think that will be a very friendly and welcoming thing for downtown workers and downtown visitors, as well as creating consistent enforcement. Ö There are a whole lot of things that consistent enforcement is going to do for us. If we have these 1,100 meters turn over at least every 2 hours, we're taking 1,100 spaces and turning that into at least 4,000 spaces.
One of the things that we are really excited about doing very soon is rolling out a multi-space parking meter, which will aid in the streetscape that we are all working on already, getting rid of some of the clutter of single-space meters. The great thing about multi-space meters is that they accept credit cards as well as cash, so you don't have to carry a pocket full of quarters.
Do you anticipate pushback from the public as a result of the stepped-up enforcement?
GM: Some people are going to think having to pay for parking is a problem. That's not something that we're going to be able to change. As a matter of fact, we're hoping that more of that is going on, because as you pay and then you leave, the next person can come in and take that same space.
... There have been a lot of problems with parking just because of a lack of information. People plan an event and have not had an individual to coordinate with. For instance, I just met with the Roots and Heritage Festival Group related to parking. Well, for years, they've put on this awesome festival, and parking has always been an issue. Some people ... have been towed. Well, this is the first time they've pulled in someone like myself to talk about parking way ahead of time and get this worked out. I know where all the availability could be, and we addressed some of the hot spots.
Another thing that we've done: in the past, parking meters were supposed to be monitored from 8 a.m. until 6 p.m. I've been participating with the Downtown Entertainment Task Force, and in an effort to help with the nightlife and after-hour activities, we've reduced those hours of operation to 5 p.m., so all the meters are free after 5 p.m. in the downtown area.
It can be a pretty daunting experience to have your car not just ticketed for staying in a space over the limit, but sometimes booted or towed. Are those things going to be happening?
GM: Well, my philosophy on towing is I want to stay as far away from it as possible. But I do see booting a very viable situation that we do plan on rolling out. The details of it we don't have together just yet, but I would say that that's coming. And what would happen is - let's say that you have three expired tickets and we come upon your vehicle - that fourth ticket could be the four times and you're out, and we put a boot on your vehicle. But I've worked in the parking industry for 13 years, and the difference between dealing with booting and towing is incredible. As far as booting, if you walk upon your vehicle and it's got a boot on it, most people will say, ah, they caught me. You can see your CD player in there and everything's fine. You just need to take care of your ticket, and the boot will be removed immediately. So that's to put teeth in the operation of writing tickets; that's really where we need to go. Otherwise it will be the situation we're in now, where people have tens of tickets and hundreds of dollars that they owe, maybe even thousands in some cases, and there is really nothing that's been done about it.
Are parking fines going up?
GM: Currently, if you didn't pay a meter or you overstayed the time or parked in a loading zone inappropriately, those types of tickets are $15. If you don't pay them within ten days, it escalates to $30. That rate has been in place since about the year 2000. I think a ticket for not paying a meter used to be $4 prior to that time. We don't plan on increasing those rates. There may be a time in the future where we would add an additional escalation; you know, for the person who is just refusing to pay the ticket, it may go up. But that $15 initial ticket, we're not looking at increasing that.
Downtown nightspots complain that taxis waiting to pick up patrons are being told to keep moving by police who are just doing their jobs because there are no official taxi stands. Are you looking into this?
GM: We could maybe take some meters, and we're already looking at doing that, where Monday through Friday 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., that's a parking meter, but then it's a taxi stand after 6 p.m. to 6 a.m.
A request for proposals was sent to various parking management companies, soliciting bids for managing Lexington's 1,100 on-street parking spaces as well as city-owned garages. Who won the contract?
GM: Republic Parking System. They are based in Chattanooga, Tenn., and for about 20 years have run the parking out at the airport, and they do a brand new shuttle system for the University of Kentucky at the new garage at the hospital where the construction work is going on. They do a 24-hour shuttle there for UK. So they were already here in the community, but not specifically in downtown.
Do other cities outsource parking management?
GM: Sure. There's a list of well over 20 to 30 cities who have outsourced either their garages and/or their on-street part of their program. Ö There are many different governmental departments or divisions that have their hands in this issue, on- street parking especially, be it the Division of Revenue for the revenue in the meters, traffic engineering, placement of the meters, the computer services or IT department keeps the database. And you can go on and on. Ö Putting all that under one umbrella sure makes things a whole lot more efficient ... Expenses go down typically when you outsource.
Closing thoughts?
GM: ...Put my e-mail address out there, gmeans@lfucg.com.