Time’s up for parking scofflaws
City will step up enforcement of time limitations for on-street parking spaces
WOONSOCKET – From Market Square to Monument Square, traffic signs on Main Street warn motorists that parking is time-limited, but anyone who spends much time downtown knows they’re mostly paper tigers.
So rarely are scofflaws ticketed by the police, employees of local businesses and other regular visitors routinely park all day long, far exceeding the one- and two-hour limits along downtown’s traffic backbone.
“Enforcement has been lax, even in the 18 months I’ve been here,” admits Police Chief Thomas F. Oates III.
You’ve probably already figured out what’s coming next, but just so it’s plain – the parking party is just about over. Members of the Woonsocket Police De- partment have been instructed to embark on an aggressive campaign to curb overtime parking in the downtown area, effective Feb. 26.
Oates said members of the Traffic Division have been leafletting businesses with the news and advising owners to alert their employees. He said he’s trying to generate as much advance publicity
about the enforcement effort as possible so motorists won’t be caught off-guard.
“I don’t want anybody to be surprised,” said Oates. “I’d rather not ticket. I’d rather have people comply.”
A ticket for overtime parking will cost $10 – the same as it has been for years, and perhaps one of the most lenient overtime parking fines in the state. But Oates says the WPD isn’t cracking down just for the sake of gaining increased compliance.
Downtown is supposed to be a business zone, he says. With more storefronts filling up – and some promising prospects in the pipeline – Oates says the idea behind the campaign is to keep spaces in front of retail establishments open for customers longer.
The campaign to free up on-street parking is getting its primary push from City Hall, where Mayor Lisa Baldelli-Hunt says economic activity on Main Street has nudged up to the point where traffic enforcement is needed to promote a business-friendly environment.
Baldelli-Hunt said the campaign will benefit existing businesses by ensuring customers a convenient place to park, but there are other reasons for police to amp up the ticketing.
She said one of the most frequent questions prospective tenants for Main Street vacancies have is about the availability of parking. In order to make a strong pitch to a potential suitor, city officials have to be in a position to say that on-street parking is part of the mix and that police enforcement guarantees its availability.
As it is, many of the available parking spaces on Main Street are routinely used by employees of existing busi-
nesses.
“They’re really not rotating out those spaces as quickly as they should,” said the mayor. “In order to be business-friendly to customers, you want to keep those spaces open and available as much as possible.”
Workers at City Hall are as prone to gobble up Main Street parking as their nonprofit and private-business neighbors farther south. Municipal workers have been advised to park in designated, city-owned lots across the street from City Hall and on nearby High Street. Other employers on Main Street have dedicated lots on the Truman Bypass and they should begin using them for their workers as the new enforcement campaign kicks in, the mayor says.
At least one member of the City Council is giving the parking rules a thumbs-up.
“It’s common sense,” said Councilman Christopher
Beauchamp. “Businesses will be pushed away from Main Street if they find out they don’t have parking for their customers.”
For now, there is no talk of enforcing any sort of time-limited parking in the Mullen Lot, across the street from The Call. But some business owners think discouraging on-street parking will probably lead to overcrowding in the lot – already jam-packed with motor vehicles on some days – especially Thursdays, when Municipal Court is in session at City Hall during the day.
“It won’t affect me – my customers are in and out of here in less than an hour,” says Virginia Cooke, the owner of Main Street Cafe. “But if they do that it’s going to push more cars into the parking lot across the street.”
At International Barber Shop, which just opened about two months ago in the Commercial Block, custom-
er Michael Bodnar agreed. If shooing cars off Main Street is a pro-business strategy, Bodnar thinks it will backfire, clogging up off-street parking lots and ultimately pushing patrons to seek out spaces that are farther away from their destinations than they’d like.
“I don’t think it’s a good idea,” said Bodnar as owner-operator Luis Roman carefully trimmed his beard. “There’s only so many spaces for all these businesses around here.”