Mayor John Hollar thinks the city’s parking requirements for businesses wishing to locate in the city are too onerous and may be discouraging development.
He raised the issue at a recent meeting of the City Council, in an agenda item that sought to determine whether parking requirements in the city’s zoning ordinance should be reduced or eliminated in the downtown district.
Hollar indicated he thinks the requirements are unfair compared with what existing businesses have had to do.
New development must provide a certain amount of parking per square foot under a formula that factors in the number of employees at a business and other impacts. In some instances, contributions may be made to a city parking fund.
How other cities deal with a shortage of parking in their downtowns was raised.
Michael Miller, the city’s new director of planning and community development, said there is what is called the common good, and he said by adding new parking demand with new development, existing needs can be squeezed, potentially hurting existing enterprises.
“There are a number of things we can do to make things better,” said Miller, including reducing the number of parking spaces required.
Miller suggested everyone could start to be treated equally, with no “grandfathering,” and said communities can address parking issues in different ways.
“Why are we treating the latecomer, who we want to invest, any differently (from existing businesses)?” asked Hollar. “That doesn’t make sense to me.”
He pressed the question of why it is the city’s job to force developers to provide a certain amount of parking, when the market would address that; for example, a homebuyer would not be interested in a home without sufficient parking. Hollar questioned the logic behind the minimum parking ratio requirement, saying developers are forced to create that amount of parking or “pay into a pot that probably isn’t going to be used for parking.”
“It creates an arbitrary obligation...”he argued. “It may be too little or too much,” and it makes any project more expensive upfront.
The mayor said the city could look at the need for parking as a public good and look to finance a parking garage, an idea that Miller said he would support.
Councilors discussed the merits of a municipal garage versus a privately developed one. Miller warned that private garages can present unexpected challenges, “because then you have someone on the other end trying to maximize their profit ... and you can end up hurting your downtown because of price.”
Hollar said he didn’t see a private garage developer wanting to come here.
One councilor suggested that most cities have privately owned garages, but Councilor Thierry Guerlain replied that both Burlington and Rutland have municipal garages in their downtowns.
“We have this big elephant in the room that we really haven’t talked about, and that is where many of the answers lie,” said Guerlain of the need for a parking structure that could hold 400 to 500 cars. He said he felt it was critical to economic development for Montpelier.
Councilor Dona Bate said new development should share responsibility and costs for helping to meet new parking demands they create in Montpelier. “I do think the new business on the block should help,” she said. She added that when a new development is charged an impact fee, the money should be aimed at parking solutions.
According to City Manager William Fraser, that is already the case. The money contributed as parking impact fees, according to Fraser, has been used and is in reserve for a parking replacement fund “to create parking spaces over the years.” Fraser added that it’s not a large amount of money.
“I think this is a really good question, but it really touches on the bigger question of how we’re going to stimulate development in the city,” said Guerlain. “We’ve danced around this question for as long as I’ve been in Montpelier, since 1987.”
Amy Ash Nixon is a reporter for the Barre-Montpelier Times Argus, where this story was first published. This story was originally posted with the headline Regional Report: Parking Garage Discussed In Montpelier.
