Parking issues Downtown and across the city continue to confound Prince Rupert Council

One theme that seemingly has no quick fix ahead, at least judging from last week's Public Hearing review of the new Official Community Plan by Prince Rupert Council is that of parking.  

The oft controversial  topic of note that can frequently find much in the way of commentary from residents  directed towards their elected officials.

The shortage of parking spots in the downtown core  and what will be needed in the future, got a start related to discussions over plans to allow for more secondary suites in residential areas and how in some areas of the city, that would not be a workable theory, an observation relayed by Councillor Barry Cunningham.

That morphed into a wider discussion on parking with Councillor Cunningham noting of the issue of boats, trailers, motor homes and trucks taking up space on city streets. 

The councillor observing on the limitations faced by the bylaw enforcement office on the issue and the need to develop some kind of space for rent for such items to migrate to, suggesting the old Pulp Mill shed at the City's Watson Island Trade and Logistics Park.

"We've got to find an alternative for these motorhomes, trucks, boats and everything else on the streets, we get them off the streets we've solved a big parking problem. You know we've got to find an alternative to that, I brought up the B Mill pulping shed at the mill there, the roof needs to be fixed ... " 

The Councillor followed up  by noting that once there is a place for residents to store the range of items currently found on the streets, there needs to be a commitment towards bylaw enforcement, noting how the city needs to move away from its current complaint driven process.

"Councillor Niesh and I have been hammering away at enforcement for quite a while, I understand that we might be down to one bylaw officer because one has moved to another job, even with two bylaw officers they're struggling to keep up. We've got to get rid from this complaint driven bylaw the've got to be able to go out and do their job, if they see a problem they do something about it"

Noting of some of his observations around town and the comments he's heard from residents of the community the councillor stated that no matter where you go, many of the streets of the city are starting to look like a garbage dump.

Later in the discussion Mr. Cunningham turned to the city council's desires for new development in the  downtown area. 

The councillor noting that providing parking or the proposed plan of parking fees set towards $12,500 in lieu of it, may prove to be a prohibitive thing for would be developers.

"If you're going to build a million dollar project downtown and if it needs ten parking places, you've just  added 12.5 percent more up front, building cost, even though you're going to give people tax breaks. It's harder to get money up front to build something than have it later on when you're getting it back ... I've already talked to two people who say that they wouldn't even start projects if that was the case ... 

That $12,500 is going to hinder development downtown, especially with new buildings. We've got empty lots downtown and they're going to stay empty if people got to come up with 60-72,000 dollars for parking fees. I know we've had parking problems, we've had it for years and it has got to be solved ...  I think parking is something we gotta  take a very serious look at, there's empty lots downtown that we could be turn into parking ... You know, I don't know, I've talked to a couple of people that are thinking of projects downtown and they're balking at that when they got come up with that kind of money 100,000 dollars" -- Councillor Barry Cunningham

The Mayor called on the city's contract planners from iPlan to explain the city's proposal on parking fees, towards the explanation Rob Buchan explained how it was a difficult issue and noted that iPlan had completed a study in January on parking for Council. 

As part of that review they examined the standards in Prince Rupert compared to other communities in Northern British Columbia, from that work they came up with the approach of  a mix of parking and  a strong transit complement to it.

The recommendation from their commentary on the night was that it was important that the city get into an effective parking strategy and that the parking standard would be in the bylaw, but that Council would have the ability to vary that standard with any application.

"So if somebody can't meet the bylaw standard, even the reduced standard, rather than going cash in lieu they can come to you and ask for a variance if there's a good reason, in that context. But to have it a cash in lieu standard of ... 200 dollars for a space, we might as well not have any parking standards at all. Because you're not going to get parking and the long term impact of that for your downtown will be disastrous. 

Your businesses will not be able to survive, unless there is a way to bring in customers. You can augment that with a lot of downtown residential development. You can  augment that with transit and that's what we've done with the lower standards, but there has to be enough; so we recommended to you what we thought was enough parking standard. 

And for those places where it's really difficult to achieve that, a cash in lieu that gives us at least the minimum amount to even begin to deal with putting in parking. And  for even you know for even those unique times where that's a problem they can apply for a variance"-- Rob Buchan from iPlan Ltd.

Mayor Brain observed that as the Council was moving forward with a parking strategy, that when developing lots they would be looking for clarity as to how much funds they could raise to develop things, noting how they haven't been able to raise any money based on the current fees process.

Councillor Cunningham re-engaged to the theme noting that the current problem downtown is more along the lines of shop owners and office employees using the spaces downtown and playing a game of musical cars through the day owing to the two hour parking limit, with customers left out of the available spaces there.

He also noted that few in Prince Rupert are using transit, as well as to speak to some of the charges in other communities as well as the challenges in Prince Rupert and how using some of the empty lots in the city could be a temporary solution. 

Councillor Niesh embraced the option that those special cases could apply for a variance and noted that the $12,500 was only for those planning something new, adding that they weren't paying $12,500, they were only paying that if they could not supply the parking spot.

"If we wanna solve the problem of parking, then you know we're not going to build parking lots with 200 dollar bills, we need 12,500 just to start thinking about levelling the piece of property, putting some pavement on there, painting the lines and trying to solve the problem and that's kind of been our goal the whole time to solve the problem." -- Councillor Wade Niesh

Mr Niesh left the discussion with Council with the observation that he 'doesn't see any reason to change anything at this moment and that anything can be changed at any time'

Councillor Blair Mirau offered up his view of how the city should approach a parking strategy, noting of the other element beyond fees, that of the relaxation of rules that the city has also looked to adopt with the new OCP. 

Changes that will see some relief for many local businesses such as retail, pubs, personal services and restaurants noting how those are the key cluster of business that they are looking to encourage in the downtown and Cow Bay Areas.

He also spoke to the unique nature of some areas of the downtown and how they would impact on any plan for proponents to put in parking.

"We can't reasonably expect anyone who is developing in certain places in our downtown to actually build enough parking, it's just not physically possible in some places. Which unfortunately means that it falls to the city more often than not. And if that's the case then we have to be serious  about what we're going to do with that parking piece for those people who can't supply parking ... 

So where we agree is that the 200 dollar fee is a joke it's some kind of historical political patronage, kind of corrupt decision, I don't know why it was made. And it has done absolutely nothing to address the parking issues that have only gotten worse over the last fifteen years ... 

If you think that it's too high and it's going to impede development, then I would love to know who those developers are who are making that complaint, at the same time that we've basically put in the most generous tax exemption bylaw that this city has ever seen. 

I think they're still going to come out net positive, I think that we're still making the right decisions to incentivize the type of development that we want and really I don't want major developments, new developments in town that can't supply enough parking because then all we are doing is exacerbating the existing issues" -- Councillor Blair Mirau

The mayor put his focus on the downtown, marina and midtown areas, with Mr. Brain relaying to Council how the city will need to  accumulate money towards their goals for parking.

"You know, part of what we're trying to do is build the funds that we need to I think specifically look at additional parking lots in the mid-town, new downtown and  marina district areas. So part of the parking strategy moving forward will be to significantly increase the parking of all the three areas, it's just no doubt that the city's going to have to supply the parking, to get that moving forward. 

But if you look at how much money the parking rate has raised over the last twenty years, it's like 12,500 dollars ... no, it's about I think 90,000 dollars or something we've raised over pretty much fifteen years from that parking bylaw.

And to be honest with you one parking lot is going to be well over 100,000 dollars, 200,000 dollars to grade, to pave, do whatever it is we gotta do. So I mean at the end of the day you have to choose how we're gonna pay for these things and the reality is that we may have to be paying up front the cost to just move forward the parking and we'll have to decide how that's going to look during budget times with future budget meetings.

But for now, we need to at least try to make some effort to change the parking situation in the town, cause it's not fixed now, so you know nothing's changed because we haven't made changes like this" -- Prince Rupert Mayor Lee Brain

The full review of the parking p can be reviewed from the City's Video Archive starting at the one hour twenty three minute mark.

More notes on last week's City Council Session can be explored through our Council Timeline Feature.

A look at the elements on planning can be found here, while a wider overview of past Council discussion themes can be reviewed here. 

Cross posted from the North Coast Review.