With council passing a motion to make the transition from physical EPark machines to an app easier, Ward Dene Coun. Aaron Paquette joined the hosts of Episode 305 of Speaking Municipally to provide more context. Here's a quick glimpse:
1. Free evening, weekend parking downtown
The transition to mobile-only parking payments was criticized in an op-ed from Cheryll Watson of the Downtown Revitalization Coalition. Watson called for the city to make downtown parking free on evenings and weekends to help downtown businesses.
Paquette said he has asked administration to determine how much extra parking revenue has been earned since the city started charging for parking on evenings and weekends. "Because if it's not substantial, maybe we should revisit that, and they're looking into it right now," he said.
2. App improvements
Co-hosts Mack Male and Troy Pavlek identified several issues with the HotSpot parking app: Users can't access the app's wallet, the option to refund unused parking time is turned off, and most of the listed FAQs don't apply to Edmonton. Paquette told the co-hosts that he has talked to administration about these issues. "I have been reassured that they are going as fast as possible, working with HotSpot in order to address these concerns — time will tell," he said.
Paquette added that if the issues aren't fixed in the next few months, he will introduce a motion in council chambers calling for specific app fixes. "I may have to wade in there and make a very specific motion, but at the same time, you want to give people a chance to actually do their work before strong-arming them with a motion on something that they may already have planned to do."
3. Austerity rears its head
The transition to mobile-only payments for parking was taken to save the city money. The city's rationale for the shift is that upgrades required for the machines to accept chip and pin payments would cost $2.8 million, plus annual operating costs. But Paquette said people are starting to feel cuts to services, especially with the city retiring programs like Front Yards in Bloom and the City Farm.
"I think we've reached — no, we've passed the point of diminishing returns, where this is affecting quality of life for folks," Paquette said.
Change is never easy, he added, but every effort should be made to make the changes more palatable. "One of my big frustrations is that if you're going to roll out something so fundamentally different, front load your effort with impeccable communications and tools that actually function and function well."
The May 2 episode of Taproot's civic affairs podcast also discussed how Edmonton fared in the federal election and changes to how votes will be counted in the upcoming municipal election, and included an update from the Taproot newsroom. Speaking Municipally comes out on Fridays. Listening and subscription options are all right here.