Saying demand for commuter parking remains down, town officials are in the process of issuing 100 additional permits for the large lot right next to the train station.
On a given weekday, the Lumberyard Lot remains somewhere between 60% and 75% empty, parking officials say.
In November, the appointed body that oversees the town’s municipal lots asked Parking Manager Stacy Miltenberg to start issuing an additional 100 permits. As of the Parking Commission’s Feb. 7 meeting, Miltenberg had moved down 137 names on the list, she said—39 people wanted permits, 64 wanted to be added to a “priority list” where they reserve the right to pay for a permit in the future, nine didn’t want a permit and 25 never responded.
For 18 months during the COVID-19 pandemic, the town didn’t charge for any of its municipal lots. The Commission created the “priority list” for permit-holders because its members didn’t feel it was fair to charge people to park when so few were using Metro-North Railroad.
“We really won’t know the demand until Metro-North brings our schedule back closer to what it was pre-COVID,” Commission Chair Laura Budd said during the group’s meeting, held via videoconference.
As of the meeting, 405 permits had been issued for the lot, and another 285 people were on the priority list. Commissioners said during the meeting that the Lumberyard Lot has 354 spaces, though on the town website the figure is put at 298.
The town has always oversold the lot, in order to accommodate as many commuters as possible.
Miltenberg said parking officials have monitored the lot and, for example, if it’s clear over time that 10 to 15 spaces are not being used, the town moves down the waitlist 10 to 15 people. As of the most recently updated numbers, more than 300 people remained on the waitlist for the Lumberyard Lot. Permits cost $663.62—$624 plus 6.35% sales tax.
In the past the town has typically sold almost twice as many permits as spaces available for the Lumberyard Lot, officials say. Yet “we are sort of in the wild west a little bit with COVID,” Budd said. Even before the pandemic set in, over the past decade, an increasing number of would-be commuters worked “hybrid schedules” that included work-from-home days, she said.
Commissioner Drew Magratten said the town’s approach made sense “but as you say, if suddenly the switch goes on, if the numbers come back, we could be a tough spot because they may all show up.”
In pre-pandemic days, it made sense to ration permits and make them fairly expensive. Commuters were willing to pay the price to avoid the hassle and greater expense of driving into New York. But the lumberyard lot is now under-utilized and I think it’s wise to rethink the fees involved. I would propose lowering the annual fee for annual subscribers, putting up 8-hour “pay to park” boxes in the lot, and giving all riders a “free day” on Fridays. This might have the additional benefit of cutting down traffic on the Merritt.
Reinstatement of the Metro North schedule to what we had on the New Canaan line for pre-pandemic options will surely increase daily town ridership. As it stands, the last return train to New Canaan without a Stamford transfer on any weekday evening is the 5:26 pm. This leads a number of riders to park at alternate stations in Darien, Stamford and Norwalk to have more direct train options later in the evening.