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Parking Meters create Poor Publicity and Punctures Profits

Recently the City of St Petersburg installed parking meters along Beach Drive - ostensibly to prevent employees from taking parking spaces away from customers - but we all know it's to increase revenue to the City.

50 cents an hour, two hour max, with a 2 hour limit. 8 am to 11 pm. 7 days a week! Different blocks have different maximum times and different enforcement hours, but that - which creates lots of confusion - is a topic for another blog!

Poor Publicity when visitors to downtown St Pete don't have change.
Poor Publicity when someone dines at a local restaurant, and sips an after dinner drink or coffee, only to return to a ticket and fine.
Poor Publicity when people come to downtown events like the Saturday Morning Market or today's Taste of Pinellas and come back from a great event to find a ticket and fine.

Why not, if you must have parking meters here, use credit cards with a forgiveness period of 30 minutes, that gets added to your card, none of which requires change?

Punctured Profits when people don't stay for dessert or an additional drink or coffee because the meter's running out.

Punctured Profits when the gelato shop no longer gets morning coffee business because it doesn't make sense to a customer to put in change when all the rest of the spaces are empty.

Punctured Profits when customers go to the competition a block away where there's no charge for street parking.

Why not wait til 10 am to start enforcing a parking fee? You could have the local businesses put hoods over them until 10 am or put up a sign saying, Complimentary til 10 am.

Posted by Sharon Simms St Pete FL - CRS CIPS CLHMS RSPS on 05/31/2009 12:42 PM

Comments (8)

Parking Meters on Beach Drive in the Regional (Localism) Channel

parking problems, parking meters, downtown st petersburg, beach drive

Originally posted at: Real Estate Views from St Pete: Parking Meters create Poor Publicity and Punctures Profits

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8 Comments on Parking Meters create Poor Publicity and Punctures Profits

MAY

Hi Sharon. I have never been a fan of parking meters cause you are always worried the time will run out and you have to run out and put some more money in it. I just view them as annoying. A symbol for making life tough. I agree with all your points.

Good Morning Sharon- Your idea for credit cards and the 30 minute foregive period makes a lot of sense and it is the very reason it will not be used by government. Isn't that a sad statement.

The city of Sedona has a pedestrian parking enforcement officer with a long stick and yellow chalk on the end. He marks car tires. If the car is parked on the main street shopping district too long and it's a local, a ticket gets mailed. No parking meters.

Gary - there must be better ways to make money than to annoy people. I wonder what the net profit really is after they deduct the meter cost, meter maintenance, personnel and vehicles to check them, personnel and vehicles to empty them, the administrative costs to account for the revenue, process the tickets, etc.

William - touche.

Chris - our Mobile Meter Mollies also chalk the tires with a long stick - that's to catch the ones who have paid the fees, but put in more money to overstay the 2 hours. On the perpendicular streets on our block there is 90 minute meterless parking, and that's enforces the same way as Sedona but from meter vehicles rather than on foot.

I'll never understand parking lots for restaurant and retail areas with parking meters. Why would the city do this to those businesses? Don't they know we can go somewhere else? We do! I make it a point to only shop or dine in College Park on Sundays, when the meters aren't hungry, and go elsewhere six days of the week.

It's no surprise they didn't want to publicize it, this way they could "catch" people and get additional revenue from the tickets that would be generated. This is so sad, as now people may think twice before coming into downtown.

I can understand enforcing this Mon-Fri, but on the weekends? You're right with the Saturday Morning Market...how much business is that going to cost the local businesses? Also, why so late on the enforcement? Another alternative would be to install the pay stations like the ones on St. Pete Beach or in Pass-A-Grille.

JUN

Parking should be free downtown on the weekends!! It is particularly greedy to make people pay for a parking meter on a Sunday!

Absolutely correct, Phil! I agree.

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