Planning Commission Agenda and Packet 2009 11 12

Home Browse Search

iitntin1t v n Louisville Framework Plan Parking Existing Conditions In summer 1997, City Staff conducted a parking space inventory and utilization study (appendix C). From this study, it was determined that there were 853 parking spaces in the study area. The study area included the area east of the railroad tracks. Of this total, 343 spaces were in private parking tots or were private spaces accessed off of alleys and 510 spaces were in public lots or on- street. At the time of this study, peak parking demand was approximately 70 percent of capacity. In late 1998, City Staff conducted a parking usage survey to determine downtown parking turnover. Thirty -one percent of the public parking supply was devoted to long -term parking. Based on the results from long -term parking in public parking spaces, the survey qualitatively estimated that 57 percent of public and private parking supply downtown was used for long -term parking. Vehicles parking for one hour constituted 8 percent of the public parking sup- ply. Generally, frequent parking turnover occurred on Main and Spruce Streets and the Library park- ing lot, with more long -term parking occurring on the other east -west streets, Front Street and public parking lots. The fact that public lots are centrally located is an asset to downtown. Prior to June 1997, City park- ing code exempted properties in the Central Busi- ness District (the area of downtown between South Street, the railroad tracks, Elm Street and the alley west of Main Street) from meeting off street park- ing requirements. Loading spaces were required. While there was no formal parking requirement prior to June 1997, many sites did and continue to pro- vide some of their own parking. Prior to implement- ing parking requirements downtown, existing private parking spaces were vulnerable to elimination as some buildings were expanded. In June 1997, the City adopted the Commercial Development Design Standards and Guidelines (CDDSG). Parking re- quirements in that document are presently applicable to downtown. However these requirements were adopted as an interim measure, with the intent to allow time to implement parking requirements unique to serving downtown needs. 20 Projections Based on the previously referenced parking study, City Staff' estimated existing parking demand gen- eration to project future parking demand based on various downtown build -out scenarios. A parking demand generation rate of 2.5 spaces per 1,000 gross square feet of building area was arrived at based upon this study. It is important to note that as develop- ment increases, presently available parking supply will inevitably be far exceeded by future parking de- mand as development increases downtown. Issues Participants in the public workshops identified park- ing as a major issue. One significant concern is the shrinking supply of available parking as downtown development increases. This is caused both by the lass of private parking spaces and the increase in parking demand. Participants indicated that down- town employees are not using lots, rather they are parking in customer oriented, on- street public park- ing close to their place of employment. Concern is that employee parking takes away from short term customer parking. Therefore, parking management is presently as much of an issue as supply. Although providing adequate parking is a major concern, it is clear that participants want parking to be subordi- nate to the overall downtown vision, which is pe- destrian-oriented. While on -site parking provides for some of the park- ing demand generated downtown, existing develop- ment patterns may cause difficulties for expansion plans in some situations. Present parking require- ments do not permit the flexibility that some prop- erty and business owners may need in providing parking, such as providing required parking ofd site.