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Articles
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| Parking complaints yield fixes, but meters still problematic |
VOICE writes, "By Julie Westfall
After a cadre of meetings and complaints, the pilot parking program instituted on the Hill to deal with baseball stadium traffic is being tweaked along the neighborhood’s business corridors and in residential areas around the stadium.
Along Barracks Row and the 200 and 300 blocks of Pennsylvania Avenue, parkers no longer have to pay for two-hour parking after 9:30 p.m. on Monday through Saturday, and parking will be free on Sundays. Previously, some businesses -- particularly restaurants and pubs -- said restrictions until midnight were inconvenient for their customers, employees and possibly hurting business. Retailers such as Capitol Hill Bikes told the office of Ward 6 Council member Tommy Wells the first set of parking hours worked well for them.
But, “We’ve had several businesses saying it’s not working the way they thought it would. If the businesses are saying this is not helping us manage our businesses the way we want it, we want to help fix that,” said Charles Allen, Wells’ chief of staff.
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Some business owners have received training from District Department of Transportation employees on how to use the new multispace electronic green meters, which are being used in Georgetown and Adams Morgan. More are waiting to receive training because rain has canceled some training sessions. But a mysterious problem with the Hill multispace meters is puzzling business owners and city officials alike. The credit card option in the kiosks -- one of its major benefits -- stops working sporadically.
“It’s a little hard to train when most of the meters are at least party dysfunctional. The mechanism that reads the credit card is not working very well. It goes in and out during the day. By 3 in the afternoon, they don’t work. This is all anecdotal,” said Sharon Bosworth, marketing manager for Barracks Row Main Street.
Bosworth said city officials and the manufacturers of the meters appeared baffled by the problem, and she speculated it is possibly due to the area’s proximity to the Capitol and interference with electronic transmissions.
But Karyn LeBlanc, Transportation Department spokesperson, said the department suspects the problem is a weak cellular signal in the area and the department is working with the cellular service provider to identify the signal weakness and adjust it on the solar-powered meters.
“We suspect it will be a couple weeks,” to fix the machines, LeBlanc said.
Until then, Bosworth said, business owners are getting used to making change for the meters again.
“They are trying so hard to be hospitable to their customers. I’m impressed with everyone’s good humor through it all,” Bosworth said.
Another problem with the pilot plan, the so-called “dinner party” issue that arose because of residents inability to obtain more than one guest parking pass for visitors, is being solved, Allen said. In the residential areas south of Pennsylvania Avenue, west of Barracks Row and in Southwest -- where one side of most streets has been restricted to Ward 6 residents at all times -- residents can now obtain multiple guest passes without the hassle of presenting copious amount of information to 1st District police.
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Posted on Jun 16, 2008 19:58pm.
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