If you’ve ever wanted to give the city a piece of your mind regarding parking policies, now is your chance.
The City of Winnipeg says it needs feedback from the public and various others in order to put the final touches on its five-year parking strategy.
The 55-page Winnipeg Parking Strategy: A Conceptual Framework outlines three primary goals:
- Ensure policies support adequate availability of parking spaces for all stakeholders.
- Support sustainable transportation and encourage shifts in transportation modes.
- Deliver ongoing service improvements.
In practice, the framework will be used to update parking prices, improve parking convenience and transportation issues, and address neighbourhood-specific requirements.
Notably, it will also include a curbside management program that will try to balance the needs of cyclists, drivers, businesses, vendors, vehicles for hire, and emergency services; all of which have competing interests for the prime real estate in between the street and sidewalk.
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Consultations are expected to happen before the end of 2020, with the final strategy sent for Council’s consideration next spring.
However, the city says it’s going ahead with a number of plans in the interim; involving a new block-by-block numbering system to learn which areas are busiest, removing under-used pay stations, and formally adopting a complimentary Saturday on-street parking policy.
The complimentary city-wide parking policy will give drivers two hours of free parking on Saturdays, with the option to buy an additional two hours before or after, except near hospitals.
City planners say a survey in 2019 showed parking price was a top issue in the city, but six in ten indicated they’d be more willing to pay if the revenue was used to improve the area they’re visiting.
Sixty-one per cent of those surveyed also said proximity of parking was their top issue, besides cost.
The current framework will appear before the Standing Policy Committee on Infrastructure Renewal and Public Works on Oct. 15, 2020.
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