newsletter9-27-2001parking

The Future of Parking (two) 27 September 2001

The following are points made during the discussion meeting

Opening Remarks and Observations

1. Assumptions: Will we need more parking? Yes....
unless people use more public transportation or work online from homes.

Could teleshopping increase to the point where congestion at the malls will be a quaint memory of past holiday shopping seasons?

What is the relationship between parking and congestion?

2. Present: really, it's okay. You can look around downtown Fort Lauderdale and find parking on the top floor of the City Garage near the Main Library...

the problems appear to be
a) at peak hours (congestion more than lack of spaces)
b) old condos (which were built for retirees that had one car per condo...now these condos have families where both adults work and teen children have cars, so there can be three or four cars in a space zoned for one car).

3. Access -- we can make parking easier.
Signs can communicate better, especially given the fad of aiming to hide parking.

Expectations are high for an easy-to-find, close-to-the-destination parking space, so education is needed: Fort Lauderdale isn't the small town it used to be.
Convenient Parking (as defined by a local) becomes scarce and less common as density increases.

A parking space that would be "thrilling" to a New Yorker is regarded as an insuperable burden in Fort Lauderdale.

4. Environment: why it's important, emissions, grass.

Future: how to get more parking...

a) maximize the use of current spaces with intelligent signs
2. signabe needs to be integrated into an esthetic whole
c) bicycle parking and encourage alternatives
d) robotics
e) grass - brick- mixtures for occasional lots that are used in peak circumstances and can otherwise serve as green spaces and carbon dioxide storage zones.
f) GPS -- mroe than just a source of information for available parking, GPS will allow you to reserve a parking space some day.

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The meeting was attended by three parking experts and Katy Chagnard gave a report on the experiences behind the Las Olas Fair's arrangements with parking. As of this writing (9-27-3001), the Christmas on Las Olas event is in danger of being cancelled because there are not enough funds for hiring the barricdes, police presence and other arrangments needed to protect the Collee Hammock neighborhood from visitor parking (the area is roughly described as the blocks bounded by Federal Highway to the west, going east to the canal at 17th Avenue, bounded to the north by Broward Blvd., and extending south across East Las Olas Blvd.)
... The Las Olas Merchants Association hopes that sponsors will be found soon.

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The meeting closed at 8:40 pm

THE TOPIC FOR THE NEXT MEETING WILL BE ??????????? on Thrusday October25. Click on this line to see the page of questions....

E-mail your response to: [email protected]