Rogers Park resident Steve Straus would rather walk several blocks than pay $1 an hour to park in the lakefront lot at Loyola Park, next door to his house.
“I would park three blocks away before I would pay any money for this frickin’ lot,” said Straus, a neighbor for 18 years. “It’s a damn shame they can’t give us permit parking. Nobody around here is rich.”
That’s why another neighbor, Maynard Krasne, thinks now that summer is over the lot should be free. Krasne said working-class Rogers Park residents can’t afford to park close to home since the price recently jumped from a quarter to $1 an hour under the privatization deal the city has with Standard Parking.
“That’s a lot of money for this community,” said Krasne, a resident since 1993. “A quarter an hour is acceptable, but when people are not using the park and beach, there should not be any charge at all in that parking lot.”
Although the lot is free from 7 p.m. to 9 a.m., neighbors say with winter coming and the park emptying out it should now be free 24/7. The lot, they say, is empty during the day because residents can no longer afford the parking, even though spaces are now available because no one is visiting the beach like they do when it’s warmer out.
They note that at $1 an hour for 10 hours a day— from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. — for 30 days a month, it now costs $300 a month to park in the lot. With the last U.S. Census reporting the median income for the neighborhood at $31,602, the meters are a “high-priced item in a working class neighborhood,” Krasne said.
“A lot less people park there now, there is no economic benefit” to the city, said Krasne. “It’s senseless.”
In June, 49th Ward Ald. Joe Moore used $89,000 of his aldermanic menu money—each alderman receives about $1 million a year to spend as he wishes on needs in the ward — to keep the lot free at night for three years, and that same amount will have to be paid annually until the free deal he cut with the Chicago Park District is up. But there will be no freebies for daytime parkers, said the alderman’s chief of staff, Betsy Vandercook.
“Nobody likes the dollar an hour, nobody’s happy about it,” said Vandercook. “But it will not be free.
“Could daytime parking be paid off?” said Vandercook. “It could probably… and us not pave any streets.”
To help alleviate parking troubles, neighbors for years have asked Moore for more permit parking in the 49th Ward, which would allow residents who don’t have a spot on their property to more easily park on the street. But Moore has not budged on the issue and has said east of Sheridan Road is a gateway to the park and lakefront, so no permit parking will be issued. Yet neighbors dispute that reasoning, and say even permit parking at night, when the park is closed, would help.
“If it’s truly a gateway to the park and beach, the lot on Lunt should be free,” said Mark Droegemueller, who lives a block away. “The people who don’t want to pay for the lot crowd the streets — Lunt, Morse, etc. — and then the residents have no place to park by their homes and are forced to pay for the lot.”
Out of 1,300 permit parking zones in the city, the 49th Ward has three, according to information provided by Kristine Williams, spokeswoman for the Chicago City Clerk’s office. Although zone sizes vary, that number is low compared to, for example, the 97 zones in the 30th Ward or the 75 zones in the 12th Ward. A parking permit costs residents $25 annually.
Williams said since permit parking was established in 1979 with the intent of establishing zones near schools and hospitals, “it’s mushroomed and grown, encompassing every area of the city.” That growth is one reason City Clerk Miguel del Valle last week asked the City Council to review permit parking, she said.
Vandercook said there will be no additional permit parking in the 49th Ward to alleviate the crunch.
“There is no plan, and I don’t believe there will be a plan,” she said.
Be First to Comment