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Neighborhoods could sprout signs like this
in Argenta if residents decide to set up
a parking district.
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If you think parallel parking is tricky, you should see the
difficulties some city officials are having maneuvering through our parking
regulations.
Ward 2 Alderwoman Debi Ross, Ward 3 Alderman Cary Gaines,
and Ward 4 Alderman Charlie Hight are behind the wheel in the effort to streamline
the current parking regulations. Ward 4 was not represented in this third meeting
that included City Attorney Jason Carter, Code Enforcement Director Tom Wadley,
and Code Officer David Schalchlin.
They are streamlining the language of these regulations in
preparation to allow neighborhoods to set up restricted parking districts if
they so choose. The need to go through the tedious process of examining the 10
pages that make up the city parking regulations is simple.
Wadley said that Code and the police department want
definitive language in place so when they write citations there are no gray
areas. There is no question that when the matter goes to court that the
citation will hold up.
Carter reiterated the importance of Wadley’s observation and
said he doesn’t want to waste the city’s time prosecuting a citation that could
be questioned by the wording of the regulation. By taking the time to make a
regulation as airtight as possible would go a long way in ensuring Code or his offices
aren’t wasting valuable time.
The process began at the first meeting held by the group
Feb.1 after some neighborhoods had approached Ross on wanting to ban parking
cars in front yards similar to what had been approved in Argenta.
Ross said Tuesday she didn’t foresee the process being so
involved, but agreed that bringing together the parking regulations once
scattered in various zoning and code areas under one document was worth the
effort.
The Argenta neighborhood is the only area in the city where
parking a vehicle on the front lawn is illegal, Carter said at that meeting. As
a designated historic district, the restriction was put in place March 26, 2007
he said, to preserve and protect what this means to such a designated
neighborhood.
“We’re capable of passing, of course, city-wide rules to
regulate parking however we want to,” Carter also said to the group in February.
“I think part of the feel has been that when we try to go with city-wide
ordinances we hit political friction to the point that it won’t pass.”
To that end the regulations now have a four page draft that
defines a restricted parking district and its establishment. It reads that if two-thirds
of the owners of property in “any [full] block, or contiguous blocks within a
residential area of the city” file a petition, they can set up a restricted parking
district.
But before the group got to the wording of these four pages
they tackled the city parking regulations – supplemented by in-place state regulations
– that would govern the definitions and regulations that will be enforced
city-wide.
The highlights of this discussion were defining commercial
vehicles parked in front of a house, the material approved on a property’s yard
to constitute a “parking surface,” the ability to wash, repair, or park a car
for the purpose of selling it on the street, the parking of recreational
vehicles – which include motor homes, travel trailers, truck bed trailers,
vessels defined as watercraft of any sort, and what constitutes an emergency
vehicle.
Commercial vehicles include construction vehicles and
transport vehicles and vehicles requiring a commercial drivers license (CDL) to
operate.
Concerns that gravel will not stop grease and oil from penetrating
the soil and possibly entering the water table were brought up. With concrete
and asphalt being the preferred material, the number of existing gravel
driveways was seen as needing to allow this material for a parking surface as
well.
Residents can wash their car in front of a house if it
wouldn’t constitute a real hazard for an accident and simple emergency only
vehicle repairs are allowed. If a person has a for sale sign in their car and
drives this vehicle regularly it is not a problem. But if the vehicle isn’t driven
and is parked in front of the house with a for sale sign attached, it is
illegal.
Recreational vehicles will be allowed to be parked in front
of a house as long as it does not extend beyond the property line. The
exception to this will be for RVs stored off-site to allowed of a 48 hour
period before and after a trip to load and unload for the trip.
Emergency vehicles
include ambulances, police and fire vehicles, and may include the parking of
tow trucks if the operator is on call while at home. Tow trucks will not be
defined as emergency vehicles, but their use as a necessary public service
brought them to be defined differently than other commercial vehicles.
There was talk that certain perhaps utility company vehicles
may be allowed to park in front of a residence if needed to respond to a
forecasted natural disaster.
The established parking districts will only be able to restrict
certain applications of these regulations. The group agreed to a fourth meeting
to finalize these applications before the parking regulations are put before
the City Council for discussion and a vote.
Two were discussed the most and included that a district may
be able to deny parking in front or side yards altogether and may deny parking
on the streets without a permit. Signs would have to be posted on all streets
on which the restriction would apply, similar to those posted in Argenta.
Whether the districts would have to pay the $25 fee for the
sign and an additional $25 for a sign post was debated, but was left to
finalize at the next meeting as well.
The next meeting was tentatively scheduled for sometime in
August.
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