Good news for anyone who worries about getting a parking ticket downtown: we'll soon be finding more details about when new options for paying for parking will be arriving downtown.
Plans are to install pay-by-plate technology to allow users to buy time at downtown parking spots using their computer, smart phone or nearby machines that will be erected in different areas of the downtown.
The plan is to bring in pay-by-plate as another option, along with traditional coins. In addition to convenience for shoppers, the technology will also allow the city to better enforce the two-hour limit on downtown spaces.
That's a big concern of businesses in the area who say people occupying the spaces all day makes it harder for customers to get close access to their businesses.
With pay-by-plate, a user can only purchase up to two hours and will have to move after that, or be ticketed. Within the two-hour limit, however, users can add time using their phone, and not have to race back to their car to put more coins in the meter.
First discussed last July, a progress report headed to the finance and administration committee May 14 will update city councillors on the plan to implement the new technology sometime this summer.
The city has an agreement with a vendor for the machines and councillors will hear details of the plan to roll out the new system. Both projects are on pace to be implemented over the course of the summer.
