Dear Tom Champion, Mark Chase and Ron Bonney,
Thank you for meeting with the Somerville Parking Advocacy and Reform Coalition (SPARC) on Friday. We appreciate that you took the time to listen to our concerns regarding the parking regulation changes, as well as the process under which they were made, and the way in which they are being implemented. Here is a summary of our concerns; most of which we discussed during our meeting.
Concerns about the Changes
- Businesses not on main thoroughfares will be impacted – some of these streets include Central St (including the Somerville Museum), Summer St, Cedar St, Temple St, Cross St, Pearl St, though others that we have not yet identified may also fall under this category.
- Artists who rent studio space in Somerville but don’t live here, as well as their customers, will not have a place to park.
- Industrial neighborhoods such as Boyton Yards, the Inner Belt and Brickbottom are not primarily residential neighborhoods so resident only permit parking does not make sense there. Some restrictions at night may be acceptable, though parking should be allowed to begin earlier in the morning than elsewhere in the city.
- Business employees- 8am-6pm does not reflect everyone's work schedule and some flexibility should be allowed. The business permit price is also a burden for many nonprofit organizations and their employees. In addition, businesses should be allowed to purchase passes in the businesses name.
- Residents – quality of life of residents will be affected by making all streets permit parking. Some possible ways to mitigate the impact would be to make the $1/car party passes available online, as well as allowing everyone to purchase a third guest pass.
- Religious services- some faith communities hold services on days other than Sunday.
- Contractors will not have a place to park on residential streets when working on resident's homes.
- Thoroughfares permit parking times should start at 2:30am not 2am
Concerns about implementation
We appreciate that some of these concerns are being addressed by the Mayor’s Parking Solutions Task Force. However, some are not being addressed, and we are still concerned with the way in which the changes are to be implemented.
- Citywide resident parking will be put into place on August 1st before the issues outlined above are addressed. This can have significant impact on the economic vitality of businesses and artists not located on the primary thoroughfares, as well as on the ability of congregants to attend religious services.
- Though this issue has brought a significant amount of community concern, there are still many people who are unaware of the changes. Residents will come home one day to find their neighborhood is now all resident parking, without communication from the City of the changes. This will cause a lot of unnecessary anxiety, and will likely cause very long lines at Traffic and Parking as many people will need to buy permits all at once.
- Business Permit availability confusion – There is currently confusion about the process and availability of business permits. People have been told there are no more permits available. Business employees need to be able to purchase permits before citywide permit parking is put in place. If they are not able to purchase them beforehand, employees may park in metered spots, if they are available, taking up spots used by customers of local businesses.
Concerns about the Process
- This issue is too big to be determined by a non-representative body without community input.
- Traffic Commission did not respond courteously to the public comments that were made at the hearing.
- Lack of community process is incongruous with the City's focus on transparency and constituent services, as evidenced by the ResiStat program, 311, Vision Planning and the All America City award.
Requests
In light of all of these concerns, SPARC makes the following requests:
- Postpone implementation of citywide resident only parking until the plan is fine tuned to address the outstanding concerns, and changes are widely communicated to the public.
- Open up this issue to community input on a citywide and neighborhood level.
- Designate a parking liaison with the authority to promptly address issues that businesses, artists and individuals encounter as result of the changes.
- Follow through on Central Business District parking management technology and pricing improvements that the Parking Solutions Task Force has been investigating.
- Appoint a member of SPARC to the Mayor’s Parking Solutions Task Force to provide more community level representation.
Many people’s economic vitality and quality of life will be impacted by the parking regulation changes. We ask that you give people a chance to let you know what these impacts are so you can adjust the plan to address theses real concerns before citywide resident parking is implemented.
We would be happy to continue to speak with you further on any of these issues.
Sincerely,
Somerville Parking Advocacy and Reform Coalition
