Parking spaces on side streets in downtown Columbus are set to revert back to three-hour time limits, effective July 1.
The Columbus Board of Works voted Tuesday to approve the Columbus Parking Commission’s recommendation to resume implementation of time limits in the following areas:
- Fourth to Seventh streets from Jackson to Franklin
- Jackson Street from Second to Fifth
- Franklin Street from Third to Fourth
- Third Street from the courthouse driveway to Jackson Street on the south side, Jackson to Washington on the north side, and Washington to Franklin on the south side
Mayor Jim Lienhoop said that the city will provide a one-week grace period after July 1, issuing warnings to drivers who violate the three-hour limit during that time. Enforcement will then resume on July 10.
“We think it’s only fair, since we had those signs up, then we didn’t have the signs up, now we’re putting the signs back,” City Councilman and Commission Chairman Tom Dell told The Republic. “Some people might not see the signs. And so we don’t figure it’s fair to ding them for a ticket just because they didn’t realize that we’d gone back to the way it was.”
The board previously approved the parking commission’s recommendations to suspend time limits on certain downtown side streets on a trial basis to see how this would affect parking availability on Washington.
“We took all the signs down on all the areas basically except for Washington Street,” Dell said.
The decision to recommend an end to these trial runs and revert the areas to three-hour parking came after a lengthy discussion at the commission’s May 20 meeting. At that time, some downtown businesses — including YES Cinema and The Cole Apartments, which are both located along Jackson — said that removing the limits has worsened their problems with parking availability.
The commission has indicated that, moving forward, its next steps may include re-examining the possibility of paid parking, which had been recommended by consulting firm Nelson/Nygaard in its updated downtown parking study.
