An increasing number of parked and double-parked cars pinch East Maple Street so tightly up toward Main that it no longer functions as a two-way street, one longtime resident told traffic officials this week.
Cars often are parked on both sides of East Maple Street, making it impassable to two-way traffic, one resident of the street says. Credit: Michael Dinan
According to David Shea, who has lived on East Maple for 23 years, commercial traffic brought in part by the relocated New Canaan Cleaners—combined with some employees, all-day-parking rail commuters and a lack of parking regulations—has exacerbated the situation in the past five months so that it’s become “pretty unbearable.”
“If somebody starts coming up and you’ve got that channel of cars, [then] somebody has got to back up—otherwise, nobody is getting through,” Shea said Wednesday during the Police Commission’s meeting, held in the Training Room at the New Canaan Police Department.
He requested that the commission conduct a traffic flow study and make recommendations that may include creating new, enforceable regulations for the Parking Bureau or possibly making the street—a popular cut-through between Hoyt and Main—a one-way street.
Looking down East Maple Street from Main. The Police Commission has agreed to green-light a traffic study of the area following concerns about an overly narrow roadway when it’s pinched by parked (and double-parked) cars. Credit: Michael Dinan
Police commissioners asked for a rundown on current parking regulations. On one side of the street, Shea said, there’s 2-hour parking between 9 a.m. and 6 p.m. on weekdays.
Chairman Stuart Sawabini said police would study traffic flow on East Maple and possibly bring in a road engineer before coming back with results and recommendations.
Asked for his thoughts, Shea said that as the street approaches Main and becomes narrows between parked cars, it may be important to make one side a “no parking” zone. Signs that had regulated parking on East Maple were pulled out when the street was repaved, Shea said, and were not replaced later. Since then, Shea said he’s seen cars parked not just overnight but for several days and even weeks at a time, including one that had been parked for more than one month and ended up with cardboard in the windows.
He added that customers of the cleaners and the business’s own trucks have been seen double-parking on East Maple.
Shea said that AC Auto Body, which has designated spots up toward Main on the south side of the street, has been a “great neighbor.”
The Police Commission’s next scheduled meeting is March 18.