COMMUTERS who work in the central Lonsdale area and use the surrounding residential neighbourhoods for free parking may find their frugal practice coming to an end.
Council decided Dec. 17 to forge ahead with plans to scale back resident-exempt parking on streets with low demand for parking and create more resident permit-only parking areas at a cost of $50 per year for a vehicle. The decision was made after hearing comment from a number of concerned residents angry over Lions Gate Hospital employees taking up street parking.
The city will also create temporary visitor-parking permits for out-of-town guests and transferable medical-need permits for residents who require regular visits of medical support staff. It will also install pay parking on the 200-block of East 15th Street and the 1300-and 1400-blocks of St. Andrews Avenue.
The changes come from a
series of recommendations staff compiled after surveying residents and holding open houses on the parking issue.
But some residents who will soon enjoy unfettered access to parking aren't in favour of it, if it means having to pay for it.
"Most of the residents on our block don't feel we should have to pay for parking on our own block. The whole problem has been created by hospital employees," said Glenys Stuart, a 12th Street resident.
The solution pitched by Stuart and several other residents who came to speak at the meeting is to persuade Lions Gate Hospital and the health authority to allow free parking at the site.
"We don't blame (hospital staff) for parking in residential areas because the parking is prohibitive. It's probably over a couple thousand dollars per year," she said. "I think if someone is going to a hospital, they're either working there, they're sick or they're visiting someone. It's not like it's a recreational thing or shopping. It's a time of stress and to make it as pleasant as possible, I think parking should be free."
The health authority is looking into reducing its staff parking rates and lowering the cost for visitors who come at peak visiting hours to help dampen the temptation to park in front of residents' homes.
But free parking isn't on the table, according to VCH staff who sat in on Monday's meeting, as the money offsets the cost of parking infrastructure maintenance, and it is a source of revenue for patient care.
Beyond trying to beckon drivers back to its parking lots, the hospital is also trying to encourage employees to bike, walk or take transit to work whenever possible.
Parking is a perennial issue for local governments, and not unique to North Vancouver, Coun. Craig Keating noted.
"There is nothing else in municipal politics that attracts concern and angst like parking," he said, adding that city staff had done an excellent job of coming up with a "temporary solution" to the city's parking challenges.
To fully remedy the city's parking woes, council needs to look at increasing parking supply by allowing alley or laneway parking and putting in angle parking on streets wide enough and quiet enough to handle it, he said.
Keating suggested the city and private sector make better use of technology to record and broadcast available parking spots.
"The problem we have is not absence of parking. It is a poorly rationalized system of parking because we don't have enough information about the parking," he said
The city is also looking to remove the resident-exempt parking on the 100-blocks of East First Street and East Third Street.
The city will first have to create its new resident parking policy and amend the necessary bylaws before implementing the new guidelines. The staff report did not give a timeline for that.
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