Welcome to City-Data.com Forum!
U.S. CitiesCity-Data Forum Index
Go Back   City-Data Forum > U.S. Forums > Pennsylvania > Pittsburgh
 [Register]
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
View detailed profile (Advanced) or search
site with Google Custom Search

Search Forums  (Advanced)
Reply Start New Thread
 
Old 07-31-2012, 07:32 AM
 
Location: Mid-Atlantic
12,529 posts, read 17,446,660 times
Reputation: 10629

Advertisements

Quote:
Originally Posted by szug-bot View Post
and thats a joke, considering the dynamics and the vitality of the Strip, compared to, say, downtown, where meters are enforced.

the mayor backed down to suburbanites who make a killing with their businesses in the strip.

You're right, only city people should be able to own businesses in the Strip.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message

 
Old 07-31-2012, 07:41 AM
 
Location: Philly
10,220 posts, read 16,734,236 times
Reputation: 2971
Quote:
Originally Posted by szug-bot View Post
and thats a joke, considering the dynamics and the vitality of the Strip, compared to, say, downtown, where meters are enforced.

the mayor backed down to suburbanites who make a killing with their businesses in the strip.
it's even worse than that, he failed the basics of being a politician which would be to sell the idea and, perhaps, broker a compromise (say, meters to 24th st, a dollar an hour on saturday, and evaluate the results in six months). just reading through this thread there appears to be the seeds of compromise...with copanut saying he'd pay m-f..even suggesting discounted rates on saturday. retailers don't benefit at all if someone parks in front of their store for 8 hours. of course, maybe the mayor is still upset about the parking battle (of course, it seems to me the private parking operator would not have forced people to carry bags of quarters around or raised rates and then left most of the spaces empty.) your point about downtown is right on, it's probably easier to find a spot downtown on saturday than in the strip.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 07-31-2012, 07:56 AM
 
20,273 posts, read 32,877,652 times
Reputation: 2910
I think all the blood-letting over the parking lease probably does explain his lack of gumption in this case. It is clear he still understands why it makes sense, but is requiring political cover from the local business community:

Quote:
"The only way this directive will change is if Strip District business owners would like the meters to be installed in order to improve 'in and out' parking that will boost customer circulation, or to prevent people from parking all day who are not necessarily visiting the business district, e.g., people parking in the Strip District in front of Penn Mac, who work three blocks down," said Ms. Doven.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 07-31-2012, 11:08 AM
 
5,894 posts, read 6,842,546 times
Reputation: 4107
I don't see why a retailer in the strip would support the proposal - if business is currently good with the free parking what incentive would they have to change the status quo.
Likewise if you're the mayor, why would you support the paid parking unless your constituents were pushing for it. Being as I see no one backing the effort, there's only political downsides to him in supporting the idea. A bit of democracy in action.

Besides the city recieves criminally low percentages of the revenue collected by the parking authority anyways.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 07-31-2012, 11:17 AM
 
Location: Philly
10,220 posts, read 16,734,236 times
Reputation: 2971
Quote:
Originally Posted by UKyank View Post
I don't see why a retailer in the strip would support the proposal - if business is currently good with the free parking what incentive would they have to change the status quo.
Likewise if you're the mayor, why would you support the paid parking unless your constituents were pushing for it. Being as I see no one backing the effort, there's only political downsides to him in supporting the idea. A bit of democracy in action.

Besides the city recieves criminally low percentages of the revenue collected by the parking authority anyways.
if you're a retailer, you probably want a one hour limit but free to generate turnover. for retailers, the worst thing that can happen is people take up spots all day and spend nothing in your store on the one hand, and people don't come if it's too expensive on the other. I would be hesitant to support the proposal as is if I were a retailer, but would be open to a change. OTOH, bars probably don't like it at all.
at any rate, democracy in inaction might be more accurate.

Last edited by pman; 07-31-2012 at 12:27 PM..
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 07-31-2012, 11:20 AM
 
20,273 posts, read 32,877,652 times
Reputation: 2910
Quote:
Originally Posted by UKyank View Post
I don't see why a retailer in the strip would support the proposal - if business is currently good with the free parking what incentive would they have to change the status quo.
Presumably because business could be even better.

But yes, punting to the business owners is likely to kill the plan, particularly since even if they secretly thought it was a good idea, they likely wouldn't want to be on record supporting the idea if it was unpopular with their existing customers.

Quote:
Likewise if you're the mayor, why would you support the paid parking unless your constituents were pushing for it. Being as I see no one backing the effort, there's only political downsides to him in supporting the idea. A bit of democracy in action.
Again, presumably the idea would be that the Strip would do a better job serving its various stakeholders, at least on an aggregate basis, with rational parking policies. Of course whether the Mayor would benefit politically from such an outcome is a different matter. But it is not necessarily determinative what people think about the idea in advance, because for various reasons people tend to overestimate the costs and underestimate the benefits when considering this sort of proposal in advance, such that the relevant policies can be a lot less controversial after they get implemented and people gain real experience with them.

Incidentally, I'm not sure how it would work in this case, but based on the parking lease fiasco, it seems possible to me that the Mayor could come out full force in favor of the policy and still lose, say if he could be overruled again by Council. That would really be a disaster from his perspective--all the pain and none of the gain--so even if there was some case to be made for the long-term political benefits of better policies, it may not be worth the risk of failure.

Quote:
Besides the city recieves criminally low percentages of the revenue collected by the parking authority anyways.
Just an aside, but in my view the most important goal of rational street parking policies is just to do the best possible job allocating this scarce resource to maximize the ratio of benefits to associated costs. If it also raises revenues, fine, but I think that is secondary to these other policy goals.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 07-31-2012, 12:52 PM
 
Location: Pittsburgh, PA (Morningside)
14,361 posts, read 16,879,345 times
Reputation: 12390
Personally, I'm someone who avoids going by car to the Strip often because parking is such a hassle - and I live in Lawrenceville!

Yes, I am all of a 10-minute drive from the Strip. But the taking roughly as long to find a space as to drive (unless we leave super early) just irks me.

I have no problem paying for parking. I'm actually the sort of person who parks in the first space I find, regardless of cost or closeness, rather than hoping for a better space to arise. But I hate the whole dealing with shady private parking attendants who may or may not actually be there at the time, and I hate paying daily rates when at most I'm going to be shopping at Lotus and a few other places for 90 minutes.

Since I bike through the neighborhood every weekday, I will stop in after work at places still open after five. It's a pleasure going through the neighborhood when it's all-but empty instead of thronging with cars. I really wish more of the businesses were open in the evenings.

Just to show, for the $ lost due to a change like copanut, there will be people like me who will be more likely to go down there.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 07-31-2012, 12:55 PM
 
Location: O'Hara Twp.
4,359 posts, read 7,483,988 times
Reputation: 1611
From my perspective the Strip District is a vibrant business community. Why would you want to mess with a good thing? There are a lot of people that linger there on the weekends. They have their coffee at La Prima and then they stop at a couple of stores. I bet most people are there for between 1-2 hours.

Sure parking could be better utilized but realistically I would think the city stands a better chance of screwing the parking situation up then making it better.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 07-31-2012, 01:21 PM
 
Location: Philly
10,220 posts, read 16,734,236 times
Reputation: 2971
Quote:
Originally Posted by eschaton View Post
Personally, I'm someone who avoids going by car to the Strip often because parking is such a hassle - and I live in Lawrenceville!

Yes, I am all of a 10-minute drive from the Strip. But the taking roughly as long to find a space as to drive (unless we leave super early) just irks me.

I have no problem paying for parking. I'm actually the sort of person who parks in the first space I find, regardless of cost or closeness, rather than hoping for a better space to arise. But I hate the whole dealing with shady private parking attendants who may or may not actually be there at the time, and I hate paying daily rates when at most I'm going to be shopping at Lotus and a few other places for 90 minutes.

Since I bike through the neighborhood every weekday, I will stop in after work at places still open after five. It's a pleasure going through the neighborhood when it's all-but empty instead of thronging with cars. I really wish more of the businesses were open in the evenings.

Just to show, for the $ lost due to a change like copanut, there will be people like me who will be more likely to go down there.
what would it take to get you on a
bus to the strip?
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 07-31-2012, 01:52 PM
 
Location: Pittsburgh, PA (Morningside)
14,361 posts, read 16,879,345 times
Reputation: 12390
Quote:
Originally Posted by pman View Post
what would it take to get you on a
bus to the strip?
I have no problem taking the bus - I do it all the time in the winter. It's a bit more of a hassle with a lot of bags, but it's not like I need a transfer to get to the Strip.

My wife, sadly, is weirdly anti-bus for someone whose so up on urban living (she basically says she rode it enough when she was in her 20s and doesn't want to anymore). And when you have a toddler, these shopping trips generally have to involve the whole family.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.

Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.


Reply
Please update this thread with any new information or opinions. This open thread is still read by thousands of people, so we encourage all additional points of view.

Quick Reply
Message:


Settings
X
Data:
Loading data...
Based on 2000-2020 data
Loading data...

123
Hide US histogram


Over $104,000 in prizes was already given out to active posters on our forum and additional giveaways are planned!

Go Back   City-Data Forum > U.S. Forums > Pennsylvania > Pittsburgh

All times are GMT -6.

© 2005-2024, Advameg, Inc. · Please obey Forum Rules · Terms of Use and Privacy Policy · Bug Bounty

City-Data.com - Contact Us - Archive 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37 - Top