r/corvallis • u/Murky_Win6850 • 1d ago

Downtown Corvallis Parking Questionnaire

https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/corvallisparking?fbclid=IwY2xjawJaPQZleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHV_-LfeCHx1A6oQk3wMt39YXr5NnO6ivMHlNdjvP8aXRgiyNNorZz02bHg_aem_RqmPPo1uYvV-SN7Po8dy2g

Please take this survey and tell the city we don't need paid parking downtown! I moved from a much larger city where parking cost a ton of money all day every day and it's just awful. Free parking downtown is one of the best things about Corvallis.

18 Upvotes

91% Upvoted

10 comments sorted by

14

u/pentatomid_fan 1d ago

Thanks for posting this. I took the survey, which I thought was a little strange: I don’t think “no opinion” for the medium choice is quite the same as “not very difficult to find parking during peak times”, and peak times aren’t defined (and if I’m being very critical, data is plural). The two scenarios presented were a little confusing. Is there a specific reason they are proposing changing the parking? I sympathize with people that work downtown during the day,  I’m not sure if there are lot of options to park all day. As a resident, it’s occasionally a little difficult to find parking on a Friday evening but otherwise I’ve not thought about it. 

12

u/Murky_Win6850 1d ago

In my experience these city surveys tend to be written in a way that will give them "data" that will support whatever they've already made up their mind to do. I agree the questions were worded poorly and confusingly. I guess they think it's too hard to find parking? And charging will make it easier? So the goal is for fewer people to go downtown? Unclear. This will just drive people to park further out in neighborhoods and annoy the residents there/or not go downtown at all. I think there is a way to provide parking options for downtown employees without charging residents money to go get lunch on a Tuesday in the summer when there is tons of open parking. 

0

u/Euain_son_of_ 11h ago

I think the problem is that that everyone wants free parking and they drive slowly but dangrously, never looking for pedestrians or cyclists, along all of 2nd street to get as close as possible to their destination. There is always plenty of parking south of Washington, and probably north of Van Buren as well, I just don't go that way as often. People who want free parking will now know where to go and stop cruising 2nd street at 10 miles an hour, stopping unpredictably and turning without signalling. For anyone else just willing to pay a small fee, they can actually pop in and out of a store or whatever as they please.

And most importantly, places like Treebeard's that actually pay for parking spaces that are otherwise generating zero revenue will have a clear justification for having tables outdoors year-round if they want to. I've been there three times during nice weather over the past month and can't get a table outside. You can fit 20 people with a beer and takeout food in the three parking spaces they will be allowed to occupy a month from now. That they should have to wait that long was a direct order from our City Manager overruling our timid City Council by the way. They were ready to approve year-round dining and he made them not do so because they were "studying parking." Here we are a year and a half later and this "study" is what he meant. What a tool.

This doesn't go remotely far enough. We should remove half of all downtown parking. It would vastly improve the experience and there would be much more downtown foot traffic.

1

u/Murky_Win6850 11h ago

I haven't been aware of the Treebeards situation, what about having free parking precludes them from having outside tables? That seems like two separate situations to be worked out. Block 15 has outside tables in parking spaces during the summer I believe. I don't see much market for outside tables year round, unless they're going to put up tents? 

1

u/Euain_son_of_ 10h ago edited 10h ago

The outdoor dining program requires Treebeard's to pay the City for the parking spaces they occupy. The City Manager unilaterally limited the outdoor dining program to May 1 through October 31. The City Council was poised to override this, due to lobbying by the community and business owners, who naturally wanted the opportunity to be outside and serve people outside during the entire duration that the weather is beautiful. The City Manager, who probably never goes outside, insisted that they not do so until they had data on parking users' willingness to pay. As of now, those spaces are free, so there is no data about how much users are willing to pay for those spaces. Drivers pay nothing, because we have decided to be slaves to the automobile. Our spineless Councilors said "OK" to this proposal. This amounted to the City Manager telling the City Council to "stick with my car-oriented personal preference and wait indefinitely until I come up with some way to measure willingness to pay."

If we can meter this area of downtown, it will show that people are not willing to pay anything to park two blocks closer to Treebeard's, obviously, and there will be a clear justification for Treebeard's to pay the going rate in March and April to set up tables in those spaces, which will be vastly more than what the City could ever hope to obtain in parking meter revenue for those spaces. This will give the Council the "data-based" solution the City Manager insisted upon--even though we are literally getting no revenue for those spaces right now at all. Had you charged Treebeard's $10 for them in March and April, I think they'd have taken the deal and it would be $10 more than what the City got for lending its valuable, centrally-located property to people who drove F-150s a distance of three or four miles to get to downtown.

This assumes our City Council has the spine to make anyone pay for parking. I'm skeptical, since it's visually obvious that most of them never bike or walk anywhere. I think they will cave and do free parking forever.

7

u/frostywosty1717 23h ago

Does charging for parking equal more revenue for the city, or does the enforcement cost more? In a small downtown area, I'd bet the enforcement would pretty much wipe out any revenue made from this.

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u/Murky_Win6850 22h ago

That's another great point. I assume many people just won't pay the meters and cross their fingers that they won't get tickets, this would seem to dramatically increase the need for parking enforcement. Even if everyone pays, fewer people will likely come downtown and it will definitely cost more to enforce. 

1

u/ResilientBiscuit 18h ago

They already have enforcement for the non-paid parking zones that have 2 hour limits.

I am not sure they would need to add more if the plan is to convert some of that to paid parking.

2

u/abstract_octave 9h ago

one free multi-level parking garage would solve most of this.

the hotel that is approved to go up on first st was only tasked with provided 40 something spots. if you include future hotel employees, hotel visitors, and employees of first-floor businesses in that building, thats easily 100 spots needed for that block alone.

whenever this hotel gets completed, parking will truly be sparse.