Parking prices are going up in downtown Olympia in 2020
It will cost you more to park in downtown Olympia starting in January.
The city plans to raise parking meter fees by 25 cents an hour at two-, three- and nine-hour meters. Permits to park for more than nine hours at nine-hour meters will go up $10 a month, as will permits to park in city-owned lots.
Raising prices was among the strategies in the city’s plan for downtown parking, finalized this spring, that looked at demand and ways to manage it in the coming years. It is not just about making money, said Max DeJarnatt, the city’s parking program analyst; it is also about freeing up spaces and cutting down on congestion from drivers circling for a spot.
“Our downtown is changing and growing and we need to find ways to get our long-term parking into off-street facilities, which are better for long-term parking,” he said. “The curb is better for short term.”
Meter prices were last raised in 2011. The city now plans to review prices and fines once a year.
More parking changes are on the horizon. The city plans to expand its pay-by-phone system, which debuted last year, into off-street lots and convert some nine-hour meters to short-term visitor parking.
City owned lots are free after 5 p.m. and on the weekends, and the city is trying to get private lots to do the same.
One of the biggest changes in the parking landscape would be the addition of a garage. The city’s parking plan calls for one, warning development in the downtown core could push parking over 90 percent occupancy in the next 20 years without it.
And it calls for — wait for it — charging for parking on Saturdays.
“Any improvements that the parking system needs — people often talk about a parking structure — that’s paid for by the people who use it,” DeJarnatt said. “Does it make sense to be giving it away all the time?”
That could be a hard sell.
“I would say that we get a fair amount of complaints about having to pay for it (on weekdays), and then on the weekends there’s not a lot of spots available,” said Megan Yeager, a manager at Spar Cafe on Fourth Avenue East.
Next door, Cutter’s Barbershop owner Cutter Taggart said people who work downtown also have a hard time finding spots.
“I don’t know really what you can do,” he said. “People who are employed down here occupy spots that could be for patrons. It’s like a circle.”
The business group Olympia Downtown Alliance has yet to weigh in on the increases. It is conducting an online survey to gauge members’ feelings, and its board could take a position next month, according to ODA Executive Director Todd Cutts.
