CRESTVIEW — Some folks who want a prime parking spot in front of the downtown business or restaurant they want to frequent say spaces are hard to come by around midday.
But those who don’t mind parking a block away say there’s plenty of parking and don’t understand what all the fuss is about.
A unanimous vote by the Community Redevelopment Agency board Monday evening paved the way for a downtown parking assessment this spring. City officials hope it will pinpoint exactly what Crestview’s historic district parking situation is and whether more parking is needed.
The board approved spending $300 to feed and provide water for 20 volunteers who will spend a 12-hour day tabulating parking data in each volunteer’s designated zone.
“Once every 30 minutes they will walk their route, walk the parking areas and record tag numbers of the vehicles that are there to accumulate data of all-day parking, incremental parking, and their duration,” Administrative Services Director Teresa Gaillard said.
“This… will give us a good count of where people are parking, how many people are parking, whether they're parking somewhere and eating, going to the beauty parlor or shopping, and then moving their car to another section of downtown,” she said.
Gaillard said the city will not announce when the study will occur “because we need a random figure.” If downtown patrons make alternate arrangements to avoid having their vehicle counted, “we’d get bogus data and the hopes of getting additional parking, if it’s needed, is gone.”
The CRA board directed Gaillard’s department to conduct the study as part of an ongoing assessment of district improvements.
“The goal is to put definite data with our general assumption that we’re short of downtown parking,” Gaillard said. “Could it be utilized better? Should we go so far as to say we need a parking garage? We won’t know until we get data.”
Residents interested in volunteering may contact Gaillard at 689-1619, extension 225.
This article originally appeared on Crestview News Bulletin: Volunteers sought to assess downtown Crestview's parking