City logs progress in wake of parking study

A parking study by engineering firm Walker Consultants Inc. determined downtown Springfield has plenty of parking to meet demand.

The study analyzed parking occupancy during a busy weekday last spring and determined at peak usage, between 10-11 a.m., 64% of spaces were open. That availability was even higher for public parking spaces at 70%.

For some who shop or dine downtown, those figures – which paint a picture of roughly two open spaces beside every parked car – may feel off. In a Springfield Business Journal informal poll from this month, 75% of 701 respondents said parking availability impacts their decision to visit downtown.

Representatives of Walker Consultants presented their findings to Springfield City Council in August 2023, after being hired at a cost of $205,000 to complete the study the previous fall.

The goal of the study, according to city officials, was to provide the city with options for improving the parking system, totaling nearly 11,300 spaces, to foster quality of place and encourage economic development.

Eight months later, the city is tackling the downtown parking situation from multiple angles, though the study’s assessment that parking is plenteous makes major expenditures hard to justify, according to officials.

“A lot of what we heard in the initial meetings with the city and others – downtown business owners as well as the public – was the reality-versus-perception of a parking problem,” said Eric Haggett, the study’s project manager from Walker Consultants’ Chicago office, in an August 2023 council luncheon. “This is a common problem, that oftentimes there is availability, but it’s not as conveniently located as some people would like.”

According to Don Harkey, CEO of People Centric Consulting Group, which operates out of an office at 429 W. Walnut St., parking may not seem like a problem to people in the know – and that may not be the case for many people who might patronize downtown businesses.

“I think parking downtown is not hard at all, but you do need to know the options,” he said. “We need to remember it’s a downtown and not have the expectation of parking in front of where we’re going.”

Haggett said the study shows that especially in the eastern and central parts of the study area, it’s possible to get to a decent portion of downtown within about a three-minute walk.

“It’s often referred to as a walking problem, not a parking problem, and that seems to be at least in some cases the instance here,” Haggett said.

Although not all 46 recommendations from the study are on the front burner for the city, officials have been working steadily to improve parking, according to Brett Foster, traffic engineer for the city.

Areas of impact include initiatives like improved lighting in parking garages, consideration of a code rewrite for parking requirements at downtown developments and coordination of efforts among downtown stakeholders.

“We’ve made some progress,” he said, noting the study has provided the city with strategies moving forward.

These are the study’s impactful recommendations, according to a list published on the city’s website:

• Hiring a parking manager
• Improving parking enforcement
• Establishing shared parking agreements
• Requiring demand studies for new developments
• Creating a parking page on the city’s website
• Establishing uniform two-hour parking limits
• Installing wayfinding signage
• Improving lighting and signage in parking facilities

Foster said because of budget and staffing limitations, it hasn’t been a high-level priority to dive into some of the recommendations of the downtown parking study, but the study offered some doable strategies for moving forward.

“As we start to address these things, we’re trying to take a larger comprehensive look,” he said.

Perception of a problem
Joshua Arnett, owner of the new and used bookstore BookMarx, has heard complaints from customers.

“People tell me all the time parking is a problem,” he said.

That idea is compounded when the customers are bringing in a load of books to sell.

“People who come here are just like, ‘There’s no parking’ – which I understand, because when I go to a different downtown – any downtown – there’s going to be no parking,” Arnett said.

Beth Domann, executive director of Springfield Little Theatre, said theater patrons struggle to find nearby parking, and the problem is compounded for those audience members who are older or have mobility problems.

“Right now, parking really is a pickle,” she said.

Productions happen in the 527-seat Landers Theatre on 311 E. Walnut St. in the heart of downtown, and a parking garage is located on the back side of the block where it is located. It is accessible via an alley, South Robberson Avenue, that lacks a sidewalk. Some businesses near the theater offer their parking for theatergoers, and officials from Phelps County Bank, now under construction in the former YMCA building on Jefferson Avenue, have promised to allow theater parking at their facility, but the problem remains, Domann said.

“The last few years, it’s just really gotten to the point where it’s difficult, and people aren’t real sure where they can park for free,” she said. “You get towed once, and the experience kind of loses its luster.”

Domann said she has heard the saying cited by Haggett – that downtown has a walking problem instead of a parking problem.

That may be true in some regards, she said, but with free parking five blocks away – that’s quite a distance for people with physical limitations or small children. Safety concerns and winter weather can add to the challenges.

“I have patrons who have been patrons for years and years, who are older now, and they’re giving their tickets away because they just can’t find a convenient place for them to park,” she says.

At BookMarx, Arnett agrees that the problem comes down to perception.

“I don’t feel like I can tell people, ‘Oh, it’s really easy to park downtown,’” he said. “I do think there is parking, if you know where to park – like, I know where I can park, and it’s not very far, but to explain that to a person who’s not coming downtown every day would be hard.”

Parking czar
Asked for an informal progress report on implementation of the study’s recommendations, Foster said many are being addressed, but not all. One example is the suggestion that the city establish a parking point person within its organizational structure – an idea that was recommended for immediate implementation.

Hiring a parking coordinator is not on the city’s radar, according to Foster.

“There’s no funding or availability to support that,” he said. “With the lack of demand for parking downtown, it’s not a super pressing problem, so it becomes difficult to prioritize that with everything else we have going on.”

The consultants had noted responsibility for planning, management, operations, maintenance, marketing and enforcement of public parking is divided among various city departments, as well as the Downtown Springfield Community Improvement District and the Downtown Springfield Association.

“Segregating those interdependent roles amongst various departments and entities can create challenges related to communication, policy, development and customer service, especially in the absence of a single point person responsible for coordinating these efforts,” the report stated.

It added that coordination of all aspects of downtown parking would increase in importance as activity and developer interest grows in the downtown area.

Parking by the numbers
The study area was bordered by National Avenue to the east, Grant Avenue to the west, Elm Street to the south and Phelps Street to the north.

Of the 11,234 total parking spots within the study area, 895 are on-street parking; 2,052 are city-owned off-street; 1,318 are private public off-street, meaning they are privately owned but available to the public, sometimes at a cost; and 6,969 are private lots, some of which are only available for building tenants or businesses.

Parking turnover and duration of stay were assessed to be factors in the availability of curbside parking, increasing the perception that parking is in short supply.

A survey of parking spaces within a three-block radius of Park Central Square found that 22% of parked vehicles, or around 223 vehicles, parked in time-restricted spaces for more than two hours on a Tuesday observation day. Of these, around 83 vehicles, occupying 20% of available on-street parking, were observed parking for more than five hours. Similar results – 20% and 18%, respectively – were observed the following day.

Focus areas
Foster said the city is about 90% ready to roll out some signage to more clearly mark areas that are not designated for public parking.

Additionally, a lot of thought has also gone into replacing a system of wayfinding signage installed about 15 years ago. Foster said city officials are working with downtown business owners and other stakeholders to improve wayfinding.

Cora Scott, Springfield’s director of public information and civic engagement, said this larger effort involves her office and representatives of Public Works, the city manager’s office, the Springfield-Branson National Airport and the Springfield Convention & Visitors Bureau Inc. That group has convened once, so the effort is very early in the process, she said.

Making clearer and more consistent signage for no-parking zones and parking garages is lower-hanging fruit from the plan’s recommendations, according to Foster. Additionally, maintenance crews have been improving lighting in some downtown garages, with LED lights to brighten those spaces, Foster said.

“We know there’s a perception of parking garages being unsafe,” he said. “As funding and time becomes available, we’ll try to improve it, but there’s not a dedicated, robust funding source to spend the hundreds of thousands of dollars it would take to do that.”

Asked if crime is a problem in the downtown area, Cris Swaters, public information officer for the Springfield Police Department, said people can draw their own conclusions using a website, CommunityCrimeMap.com, that reports information generated from 911 calls.

In the past month, one sexual assault is listed in the study area, with no other violent crimes noted on the website.

Swaters suggested some crime-prevention measures, particularly in parking areas.

“You want to park somewhere that is well lit,” she said via email. “A location with security cameras in a high-visibility, high-traffic area is also good.”

How far is far?
The parking study also looked into the issue of walkability.

“Almost universally, people want to park as close to their destination as possible,” the study stated. “This can create a perception that no parking is available in an area, unless it is available immediately adjacent to a person’s destination. In reality, parking is often available very close to a person’s desired destination, but some walking is required from the parking location to the destination.”

The study contains a graphic with an overlay of the footprint of Bass Pro Shops/Cabela’s Boating Center centered atop Park Central Square. The Bass Pro parking lot is about 1,700 linear feet, a 6.5-minute walk – roughly equivalent to an as-the-crow-flies jaunt from the former Regal Hollywood theater at 415 W. College St. to the Discovery Center, 438 St. Louis St.

“The same analogy could be used toward Walmarts or big box stores,” said Rusty Worley, executive director of the Downtown Springfield Association. “The distance you have between your car and your loaf of bread is often less than or equal to the distance you would go to get to your destination in a downtown setting – you just don’t have it in your line of sight.”

It’s a psychological issue for some, Worley said.

“Even if you don’t get a spot right in front of your desired store, it’s rare that you don’t find it in a block or two,” he said.