Town officials say they’re thinking about installing eight more parking kiosks in downtown New Canaan, on Main Street and possibly part of Locust Avenue.
An expansion of the new paid system that took effect on Elm Street and South Avenue in October, the kiosks on Main would cost $90,774, officials said during Tuesday’s Board of Selectmen meeting.
At first, the town didn’t think it would be able to convert Main from two-hour to paid spots, according to First Selectman Dionna Carlson.
“We didn’t think we could do it on Main because it’s a state road, and then in further discussions realized that you can, because it’s not part of the roadway,” Carlson said during the meeting, held at Town Hall and via videoconference. “So it’s just a discussion to start and if we even want to potentially pursue those, we’d have to have it in the budget.”
If added to the budget, the approximately $90,000 cost for the kiosks would be bonded, town Budget Manager Ryan Stacy said.
The comments came during a discussion of capital projects in the area of “general government”—namely, the Affordable Housing Committee ($225,000 proposed for professional fees), Information Technology and Parking.
Carlson noted that the town has received complaints about Uber Eats drivers hanging around Locust Avenue as a launch point for pickups. If Main Street switches to paid parking, she said, the paid spots would run as far south as the library/Cherry Street.
Further study and more discussion are needed before the expansion, she said.
The town has also received complaints about parking on Forest Street, she said.
“We’ve gotten a lot of complaints and at the time we rolled this original parking plan out, there was no thought that we could do it,” Carlson said. “So this is just a placeholder. We really need to absorb what we’ve already done.”
Though town officials have said publicly that they’ve received mostly positive feedback on the changes already made on Elm and South, downtown merchants have voiced concerns over the change to paid without a commensurate increase in short-term/15-minute parking spaces.
More control by our First selectman against wishes of the populace and retailers. We must push back. No no no. Elm Street is not working.
PLEase NO paid parking on main street
It’s awful‼️ you get s max of two hours for the day. You can’t come back later if you forget something, not to mention some dinners and movies run over 2 hours so we’ve often just said, let’s go somewhere else. Also, it changes the feel of the town to a more commercial one, like Greenwich which is a shame.
The businesses I’ve spoken to say it’s reducing store traffic which is making the expensive rent that much more challenging. Like we don’t have enough retail turnover already! Let’s call it what it really is, another cash grab🤦🏻♂️