I have been a downtown retailer for 33 years. Parking has always been a problem, as we all know. When the Transit Center was originally designed, it was also a multistory parking garage. A great plan, but some genius shot that down.
When the cost of the meters was raised, not only did it deter me and my employees from parking at a meter, but more importantly, our customers. Locals do most of their downtown shopping on weekends now as they don’t want to feed the meter.
Now, there is this great idea of making Narrow Gauge Avenue permit parking only because a few lazy folks can’t walk a couple of blocks. Hello?
Now our customers and tourists will have nowhere to park downtown, so they won’t. Remember, these are the people paying the bills, folks. It is continually apparent that this city manager and his planners really don’t care if a business like ours survives in downtown Durango.
I beg them not to make Narrow Gauge permit parking.
John Flick
Durango
