Construction puts pressure on downtown parking

In the next six to nine months, downtown Springfield will add more than 700 new parking spaces west of the square via parking decks for College Station and the Heer’s building.

In the meantime, the pressure is on to balance the parking needs of downtown customers, employees and residents.

For downtown retailers, especially those closest to the future parking decks, current parking availability varies widely.

“Actually, we’re one of the luckier ones,” said Lil Olive, owner of Good Girl Art, a gallery at 215 W. Olive. “Where we are, you can usually find a spot.”

Located between Campbell and Boonville, immediately across from the Heer’s parking deck site, Good Girl Art has access to a public lot to the east, as well as on-street parking on Olive.

However, one block – and one giant construction project – away, Har-Bell Athletics has a very different perspective.

Har-Bell, at 315 Park Central West, has a city-owned lot next door for its customers, but that lot has been fenced off during construction of the adjacent Heer’s parking deck.

Employees must park blocks away, and Har-Bell’s customers can no longer count on parking virtually at the door.

“Wherever they can find to park, that’s where they’re parking,” said Bryce Gilliland, assistant manager.

The athletic equipment store does about 90 percent of its business outside the store, serving area schools and colleges, so the construction impact is more a frustration than a blow to business. But that could change.

For more than 30 years, Har-Bell has held a tent sale in August that brings in the majority of its retail traffic for the year. The lot where that sale is typically held is now a construction site.

“They’ve taken that lot away, so I’m not sure (if the sale will happen),” Gilliland said. “There’s really nowhere to put it.”

While the perception that downtown lacks parking has been extant for many years, merchants say that now, as in the past, perception and reality are two different things.

“There are concerns,” said Mike Sowers, co-owner of Well Fed Head Books, 331 S. Campbell Ave., “but I’ve also had people who shop in my store park right across the street, then come in and tell me how bad parking is.

“How much closer can you get?” he said.

Also, considering how small the city blocks are in downtown, shoppers who park a block or two away still face a shorter walk than the typical customer in a big-box retailer’s mega-lot, said Rusty Worley, executive director of Urban Districts Alliance.

“Probably the thing that hurts us most is there isn’t a line of sight between the front door and their parking space,” Worley said, “and there’s a little uncertainty of exactly where they will park.”

But that doesn’t mean parking isn’t there.

UDA’s Web site, www.itsalldowntown.com, emphasizes that there are more than 6,000 parking spaces within roughly a five-block radius of downtown’s square, and it provides a link to a map of those lots.

UDA and Community Improvement District parking enforcement are making an effort to keep downtown employees out of public lots to allow space for customers – pushing employees toward leased parking spaces in private lots or more distant public spaces.

This has generated some hard feelings on the part of those ticketed, and in at least one case, there’s been some confusion between “customers” and “employees.”

Har-Bell’s Gilliland noted that while the public lot across the street next to City Utilities’ bus station has a three-hour limit, “We had a guy come in here the other day, he wasn’t in here 10 minutes and they were already writing him a ticket.”

Worley said he was aware of the Har-Bell customer complaint but added that it was a unique occurrence. “I think that’s really an anomaly,” he said. “Customers have three hours to park in that area, and that’s the way it’s enforced.”

Parking aside, retailers report that business is good.

“We’ve been here four years, and each year our sales have doubled, so I can’t complain,” said Good Girl Art’s Olive. “People are continuing to buy property and open businesses, and it seems like every month we have a new venue to add to (First Friday) Art Walk.”

Also, she expects that the upcoming renovation of the Heer’s building will be a huge benefit to the area.

Meanwhile, she said, she’d like to see more people discover what downtown already has to offer.

Sowers agreed.

If anything, he said with a laugh, he’d like to see customer demand make the parking situation worse.

“We need to be talking about the cool things that we can do in downtown to actually make it so it’s irresistible for people to want to come and shop here,” he said.

Validation

The parking garage for College Station will come on line at the end of the year, and while customers will be able to park free of charge by having their parking stubs validated by College Station businesses, others will have to pay. The city is currently working out the terms under which the new parking garages will be available, including parking prices and whether employee parking will be allowed.