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Science guides downtown parking prices

As part of the Durango Business Improvement District’s continuing efforts to provide education about parking in downtown Durango, here is some new information about the price of the downtown parking meters:

Parking Demand Management is the science of parking and leans on the basic economic theories of supply, demand and pricing. When done to its fullest, Parking Demand Management allows for adjustments to be made to improve parking.

The city of Durango has implemented Parking Demand Management principles for downtown Durango parking. The city collects information on available metered parking spaces several times each month during the workday and shares this data with the Durango Business Improvement District. We have data going back to March 2014. The city has recently reduced the price of meters that are underutilized.

The city has reduced the parking meter price to only 50 cents per hour in several locations. These locations include the 400 block of East Second Avenue, the 1300 block of Main Avenue and 13th Street adjacent to Buckley Park. Additionally, 50 cents per hour meters can also be found on Seventh, Eighth and Ninth Streets between Narrow Gauge Avenue and Camino del Rio. Many of these meters are 10-hour meters. Look for the yellow bands on the posts, which indicate a 10-hour meter. The goal of the price reduction is to increase demand for these underutilized parking spaces.

The most affordable parking for downtown employees continues to be in city parking lots at the Transit Center and on East Second Avenue. A parking pass for these lots costs only $30 per month, or $1 per day. A discount is given if you purchase a pass for three months or more.

I have been asked many times why parking isn’t free in downtown. Think about parking like tables at a restaurant. Restaurants want to turn their tables over two or three times each night to get the most customers in the door. Parking spaces are managed the same way. The goal is to turn over the spots for downtown shoppers.

If the spaces were free, in most cases one car would park in the prime spaces downtown all day long. The trick is to price parking reasonably, monitor usage and then adjust prices accordingly.

For more information on parking in downtown Durango, visit the parking page on our website at DowntownDurango.org/parking. On this page you will find a chart that shows which blocks downtown have the most availability on average.

Here is a tip: You can almost always find a parking spot in downtown during the work week on the 700 and 1100 blocks of Narrow Gauge Avenue and on the 1100 block of East Second Avenue.

Sign up for our weekly E-News. The E-news offers short, accurate and timely information each Wednesday morning. To sign up, text DURANGOBID to 22828 or go to DowntownDurango.org/newsletter.

timw@downtowndurango.org. Tim Walsworth is the executive director of the Durango Business Improvement District.



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