Parking problems persist for people who work downtown, and some measures taken by the city during the COVID-19 pandemic have compounded the issue, says Michael Knight.
The chair of the Downtown Orillia Management Board (DOMB) said the decision by the city’s economic recovery task force (ERTF) to offer free parking, particularly on-street parking, has made the situation worse. While it’s intended to be short-term parking, people who live and work downtown are parking there longer than they’re supposed to.
When shoppers drive downtown and can’t find a spot, “they go out to West Ridge,” Knight said.
He believes there simply aren’t enough parking spots, including permit parking, to cater to customers, employees and tenants.
“The ideal situation is creating more parking down here for everybody,” he said.
Taylor Rice, who works downtown, wrote a letter to Mayor Steve Clarke, detailing her parking woes.
“I began working downtown in July and have come to realize just how difficult it is to park for downtown employees. For about two months we were able to park on a side road that was close by,” she wrote, adding, “in September we began receiving tickets for parking there.
“Municipal Lot 10 only allows for five hours of free parking for employees. Meanwhile the average work day is eight hours. I have received multiple tickets due to having to park for more than five hours.”
Rice noted she is a student “with a lot of school debt as well as car payments and rent.”
“I cannot even afford to pay (off the) tickets I have accumulated. Myself and all of my coworkers are having this issue, as well as multiple other employees of other downtown businesses. If Orillia truly values (its) small downtown businesses and employees, it is quite obvious that something must be done for employee parking.”
“I feel for her,” Knight said. “She’s not the first. If they were smart, the ERTF should take those tickets back.”
In his reply to Rice, Clarke noted the DOMB has been authorized to issue up to 20 parking permits daily to be used in Municipal Lot 10 to merchants whose part-time staff have been affected by the five-hour parking limit.
“The DOMB would solicit requests from members who require parking permits for part-time staff who work no more than two shifts of greater than five hours per week,” he explained.
That came as a surprise to Knight.
“There’s always the possibility that I’ve missed something, but I, as the chair, have never heard of that,” he said.
Downtown parking, he added, “has been an ongoing issue with the City of Orillia.”
He said he had previously encouraged the city to keep Orillia Central School — which it has sold — on Coldwater Street and maintain the 78 permit parking spots on site. Those spots went with the sale.
A similar suggestion was made when the Orillia OPP moved into the Peter Street detachment. That also resulted in the loss of some permit parking spaces.
The city is looking to create multi-level parking at the Peter Street property as part of its plans to build a transit terminal there, but that is “too far away,” Knight said, noting it would result in some downtown employees having to walk for blocks, which isn’t ideal, especially during the winter, when it gets dark earlier.
The city’s parking reserve could be used to address the issue, Knight suggested. Instead, over the years, it has been “spending like drunken sailors” while pulling from that reserve. A recent example he objected to was the $400,000 council took from the reserve to go toward design work of the new terminal.
“That doesn’t make sense to me,” he said. “It’s not parking; it’s a bus terminal.”
If the city were to add some multi-level parking in the downtown core, “it would solve all our problems,” he said.
“That’s our best hope.”
