Parking plauges University
In order to counteract the shortage of parking in campus-town, the Champaign City Council announced yesterday, their acceptance of proposed remedies and further investigation with problematic parking availability in the city.
The remedial suggestions offered by parking officials during the council meeting were based upon a $74,000 city and University of Illinois' funded report.
The report was conducted by Walker Parking Consultants to study, find and propose solutions to parking problems in the city. The report outlined a parking shortage of more then 700 possible spaces within the 18-block commercial district it studied.
287 of those spots were located in the vicinity the intersection at Sixth and Green alone.
As of now, city council and parking officials are implementing more strict street-parking management techniques, and discussing the possibility of adding a new parking deck at the corner of sixth and green as well as a shuttle service (using Mass transit District), from campus-town to an existing 170-space parking lot located near the old Burnham Hospital Property, north of Springfield.
The city has already increased the parking rates from 50 to 75 cents in the last 4 years, and are still working on full implementation of on-street parking permits.
In addition to this, maximum meter times have been reduced (up to 8 hour reductions), angled parking, as well as tire booting and license suspensions have also been adopted to create better availability for parking in the city.
The city has also began discussions with JSM Management -- developers of the Technology Plaza in the 600 block of East Green St. -- about further construction involving first-floor commercial space with a parking deck at Sixth and Green.