The majority of the Brock Street municipal parking lot in downtown Peterborough will be leased to a developer who is building luxury apartments nearby.
There are currently 92 parking spots available at the lot. But Atria Development will be using 76 spaces as it continues to refurbish the former YMCA building, leaving just 16 spots for the public.
Kevin Jones, the city’s manager of transportation, says Atria was looking for some additional parking to market the units.
“It’s an important project for the city of Peterborough to see this Y building redeveloped the way it can be,” he said. “So we agreed to look at ways to help them provide the parking they needed to make this development happen.”
The Y-loft project is a multi-purpose building that will feature over 130 apartments at the corner of George and Murray streets. The city will lease a portion of the Brock Street municipal parking lot to the developer and in return, will pay the city $20,000 per space over five years (or approximately $1.5 million).
Debbie Ahern, a regular user of the parking lot, is concerned about the lack of spaces.
“There’s a number of my colleagues who have parked here every day and have for a number of years,” she said. “So I’m not sure what the impact is going to be. I don’t know where I’ll go.”
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Jones says the money will be invested into parking infrastructure in the downtown core. A strategic parking management study completed last fall noted parking is in high demand.
“It did identify that we need to start thinking about new parking capacity because we will run out as we intensify our downtown,” said Jones. “This is something that we’ll have to be very mindful.”
Jones says the additional funding can help start the process of securing a new parking garage.
“There’s also the Chamber Street lot which is just across the road in between Hunter and Brock,” he said. “There’s lots of on-street parking all around on George and Water and side streets — it will get a little tighter in the supply.”
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