Stamford scrutinizes parking

In a bid to further improve its attractiveness to developers, the city of Stamford is weighing cutting the amount of parking required for new developments downtown.

Besides the obvious savings for developers, reduced parking requirements might encourage some companies and their employees to consider mass-transit options to get to work.

By some estimates, an integrated parking facility can costs 10 percent or more of the cost to build an office building.

“If approved, the number of spaces required ”“ within certain zoning districts in close proximity to the transit center ”“ will be reduced, which can serve to lower construction costs,” said Michael Freimuth, director of economic development for the city of Stamford. “Within a slightly broader geographic area, perhaps the downtown, developers will be able to reduce the number of spaces by locking in alternatives such as shared parking, (shuttle) services, (and) valet systems. Some minimum ”¦ number of spaces will still be required. All of this is subject to more research, hearings and deliberation within the planning and zoning shops and boards.”?The question becomes whether reduced parking spaces at building sites could strain public parking options, which in turn could affect downtown retailers and restaurants who need those spaces for their own daytime patrons. While Stamford has been able to easily handle parking for events like “The Jerry Springer Show” and the Alive@Five outdoor concert series on Thursdays, any sustained building boom in the coming economic cycle could put public parking spaces at a premium.

 

In January, Gov. M. Jodi Rell ordered the Connecticut Department of Transportation to study parking along the New Haven line of Metro-North Railroad. Parking availability and policies along the New Haven line vary dramatically from station to station. The line carries more than 35 million passengers annually between New Haven, New York City and points in between, making it one of the busiest in the country.

 

A separate study in May by the Stamford-based South Western Regional Planning Agency found that every manager of some 20 commuter rail parking facilities cited the need to increase parking capacity.
Stamford”™s two downtown commuter-rail parking facilities have a total of 2,000 spaces, three in four of them reserved for permit parking and the rest for day-to-day parking needs. Some 900 people were on the Stamford waiting list for a permit parking space as of the time of the study, facing a wait of two years for a spot.

The region between Westport and Greenwich has more than 11,200 commuter rail parking spaces in all.

The Connecticut Department of Transportation is currently assessing whether to rebuild the city”™s parking garage to add 300 slots at a cost of nearly $40 million or whether to replace the facility with some type of mixed-used development that would include sufficient parking to handle the city”™s commuter traffic, with a private developer taking the lead.

In either case, replacing the garage would require officials to designate temporary parking at another site to handle traffic during construction, which they hope could begin by the end of next year.

In addition to the main parking garage, a second lot exists on South State Street; that lot does not have a waiting list, but few commuters buy a monthly permit there preferring to obtain a space at the main garage.