Petition Signing this coming Wednesday at Somerville Theatre

[geekpixie.livejournal.com]

This coming Wednesday, June 3rd from 6:30-8:30pm I will be at the Somerville Theatre in Davis Square (hey, someone may not know where it is..) collecting signatures in the lobby for a petition against the parking meter hour extension. Currently, the theatre is also collecting signatures at the box office as well. They're providing me a table in the lobby, so please, come on by and say hello! We need at least 50 registered voter signatures, but I am sure that more would make an impression.

Please note, this is ONLY a petition against the meter hours extension in items 9-12. I have always lived on a permitted street in Somerville, and paid far more at meters in other places, so the two other major changes are not as large an issue for me. Hurting businesses that are already suffering in an economic downtown just to scrape together a few more dollars on TOP of doubling parking rates? I have issue with. If you are unhappy about the permitting of streets, or any other part of the new regulations, I encourage you to draft a petition yourself, and organize. I'll happily sign it. It took me all of a half hour to write one up, get in touch with the ST, and set up times to be present and collect signatures.

If you are interested in a copy of the petition to collect signatures yourself, and return to me, or the city, just ask!

I hope to see you there!



Petition

On street parking meters are frequently used by visitors to Somerville who are attending concerts and movies, dining, and shopping. By extending the hours of our on street parking to 8 in all of Somerville except Magoun and Davis Sq. and 10pm in Magoun and Davis Sq., as detailed in items 9, 10, 11, and 12 of the provided excerpt from the commission's agenda, local businesses will lose patrons who cannot afford a ticket while watching a movie, and/or enjoying a leisurely dinner. In a time when the economy has done more than enough to discourage customers to local businesses, they should not be further discouraged by difficult parking time maximums and unreasonable parking meter times. The standard times for Parking Meters to be enforced are 8am-6pm for street meters, and 8am to 8pm for parking lots we request that you keep Somerville's parking meters enforced only at these times, and help, not hinder, our local businesses in their success.


We the undersigned registered voters of Somerville, Massachusetts oppose the extension of Parking Meter hours to 8pm and 10pm, and respectfully request that these hours stay as 8am-6pm for street meters and 8am-8pm for parking lots.

Comments

Re: take action, not whine? wtf?

[bryant]

I can! And I think it's in good hands. And yeah, you get the public hearing in front of the three person Traffic Board -- the trick is going to be convincing them that they shouldn't just rubberstamp the change, because that's the quickest thing to do and the city is short on time. Hm; I'd get in touch with as many aldermen as possible. Lobbying them before the meeting ought to help.

Three hours definitely seems a bit short. It's worth noting that the validation for parking at Fenway or Kendall Square allows for four hours -- that's evidence that four hours works for movie theaters. I think we've got to acknowledge that longer parking meter hours are a two-edged sword. The limits don't start at two hours for no reason; shorter limits mean more turnover and more people coming through the square shopping at more businesses. We can't pretend that effect doesn't exist.

I liked the idea of one lot with four hour meters. I can't think of any good way to restrict use of said meters to Somerville Theater customers, though. You get back to needing an attendant to handle that, which is more expense.

Re: take action, not whine? wtf?

[geekpixie.livejournal.com]

The harvard vanguard parking lot would be a great option for 4 hour meters. The fact is we have a unique situation here, most places in cambridge have private garaged parking for things like movie theaters, etc, and hotels that do private garaged parking with discounts for local businesses. I always enjoyed Northampton when they had a parking garage (where I grew up) you could park, validate at businesses, shop all over the very busy and business-full downtown, and then pay out the nose when you left the garage ;)

Now that they have a pay before you play setup a lot of businesses have closed. They don't have a good option of public transportation (bus's, not so good there) so cars is it.