BEPPLE – City can’t have its cake and eat it too on downtown parking

EDITOR’S NOTE: This column has been corrected to now state that those opposing the motion to repeal the increase to parking rates were Mayor Christian, Coun. Hunter and Coun. Dudy. The original version had mistakenly included Coun. Sinclair instead of Coun. Hunter.

A WISE BAKER once said you can’t have your cake and eat it too.  Or maybe it was a transportation planner.

Yesterday (Jan. 15, 2019), Kamloops City Council and staff demonstrated this baking rule in spades when they rolled back on-street parking rates to 2018 rates while on the same day holding a transportation choices open house.

Coun. Mike O’Reilly argued lower parking rates would get more people downtown by making parking rates more attractive.

O’Reilly was able to convince the majority of council to lower the rates.  So this week, the rates that had gone up for the New Year, are now coming down.  Only Mayor Christian, Coun. Hunter, and Coun. Dudy opposed O’Reilly’s motion.

O’Reilly’s logic is that lower parking rates will (hopefully) give more people the incentive to come downtown.

Lower parking rates is the cake.

Parking rates were lowered yesterday, and then the City held a Downtown Transportation Choices Strategy public open house.  The focus of the open house was how to get more people to not drive downtown.  The goal of this transportation plan will be to recommend ways to get people out of the cars and walking, cycling or taking transit instead.

You can’t lower parking rates and expect people to walk, cycle or bike more.  You can’t have your cake and eat it too.

I’m all with O’Reilly for wanting a vibrant downtown, which includes having parking for shoppers.

Actually, I’ll rephrase that. I’m all for a vibrant downtown, where people come.  Regardless of how they get there.

People choose the simplest and easiest way possible to get somewhere.  Cost is one factor.

As a simple example, for the last 18 years I’ve worked at Thompson Rivers University.  For almost the entire time I drove to work by myself. During that time I had many options, from walking, to cycling, to taking a bus.  But I only took the bus a couple of times a year.  I only cycled to work during bike to work week.  And I only walked a handful of times.

Since September, I have taken the bus more times than in the 18 years previous.  I usually take it two or three times a week.  Other days I drive part way and walk.  Or I ride my bike when the weather is better.  Since September I have only driven to work one or two days a week on average.

I haven’t gotten more virtuous.  Parking has become much more expensive and more inaccessible at Thompson Rivers University.  Short of leaving for work 1.5 hours earlier than I would like to, if I drive to work at my usual time, I have to park on campus 0.8 km away from my office.

It is faster and closer for me to walk to a bus stop and then take a bus.  I could pay premium rates and park closer to my office, but there are so few of those spots they’re gone a few days after they’re on offer.  Even if I was able to get a premium spot, the premium parking rates are far more than I want to pay.

For 18 years, cheap, convenient, close parking kept me driving to work by myself.  Expensive and inconvenient parking made me change.

The City of Kamloops is paying high priced consultants from Vancouver to come up with a plan to increase walking, biking and using the bus to and from the downtown.  As a poster at this week’s public open house stated, “to encourage long-term use of active and sustainable travel options such as cycling, walking, transit and carpooling.”

Any successful downtown will have a parking problem.  The more parking you build, the closer it becomes a shopping centre.  Building more parking, or making parking cheaper so that more people come downtown isn’t the solution.

For 18 years, I never changed how I went to TRU.  I drove.

If you want to get more people cycling, walking, using transit or carpooling downtown, then you need to make parking more expensive, not cheaper.

If the downtown is great (which it is), parking rates won’t turn people away who want to drive.  But it will make other options more attractive to many.

You can’t have your cake and eat it too.  But you can teach old dogs new tricks.   After 18 years of driving to work every day, I’m proof of that.  Increasing parking rates downtown needs to be part of the Downtown Transportation Choices Strategy.

Nancy Bepple is a former City councillor of Kamloops with a strong interest in community building projects.