Borough to Create New Permit Parking Zone

voted 4-3 on Wednesday in favor of a measure that would create a “by permit only” parking zone in the 400 block of West Miner Street.

Residents of the 400 block petitioned council to create the permit-parking zone in order to alleviate some of the parking congestion caused by the county buildings located on Market Street.

According to council member Cassandra Jones, the county provides parking for 900 of its 1150 employees leaving the remaining 250 workers to fend for themselves.

“I met with the county, and it became apparent that they cannot resolve this problem themselves,” Jones said. 

Council member John Manion said that creating a permit-parking zone on the 400 block helps those residents, but it does not solve the borough’s parking problem as a whole.

“This is a micro solution to a macro problem,” Manion said.  “It’s like squeezing a balloon.  They’re all just going to move up to the next block.”

Several residents from the surrounding blocks were also in attendance Wednesday night with many fearful that the parking problem would migrate to their streets.

“There’s going to be a domino effect,” said council member Jim Jones.  “The thing to remember is that streets and street parking spots don’t belong to anybody; they belong to everybody.”

“Why don’t we just make the whole town permit parking?” said Manion.  “Is that what we want?  I don’t know the answer, but the question is worth asking.”

Carl Weir, a resident of the 400 block of West Miner Street, said that the petition filed by the residents was just a mechanism to start the discussion about parking in the borough.

“We think permit parking is a good way to channel county workers into the parking garages,” Weir said.  “We’re not trying to exclude anyone, but this is the most practical solution for the here and now.”

“There needs to be a global solution,” said council member Sue Bayne.  “We can’t do this one block at a time.  This needs to be an organized effort.”

Jim Jones suggested that the borough form an ad-hoc parking committee that would begin to try to solve the borough’s short and long-term parking problems, going so far as to volunteer himself as head of the committee. 

“The county has to be given notification, and I don’t see any other solution,” said council president Holy Brown.

The vote Wednesday created an ordinance to create a permit-parking zone in the 400 block of West Miner Street.  Council will vote on the ordinance in January, and the ordinance would go into effect after that vote.

The parking permit zone would be in effect from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday.

John Manion, Tom Paxson, Cassandra Jones and Holly Brown voted for the measure.  Jim Jones, Sue Bayne and Chuck Christy voted against it.