Carmel parking meters at the heart of a heated debate

Parking progress in Carmel? That’s the heart of a heated debate between the city and its residents.

On Thursday, over 60 people gathered at the Carmel Plaza to hear city leaders give an update on the pilot program that put parking meters along Ocean Avenue. It was supposed to be a workshop to update people on the parking meters, but instead it turned into more of a town hall meeting.

“We have annoyed this group of people, our local residents, more than any other group by this experiment,” said one resident.

But Chief of Police Michael Calhoun said the parking meter experiment has brought in over $20,000 to the city so far, and the money will go back into the community.

“We put the revenues back into the downtown to improve our sidewalks, some of the facades along the business fronts and our streets to make it kind of a beautification of our downtown,” said Calhoun.

New data also shows more turnover in parking. Calhoun said with the parking meters, a space is being used three times, mostly by tourists.

“The most important thing is they’re saying they are finding a place to park which has not always been the case in the past,” said Calhoun.

But the tough crowd that attended the meeting Thursday night was not convinced, claiming the parking meters are an eyesore and create problems for residents.

“Having the paid parking on Ocean has definitely pushed cars onto the side streets. The side streets are congested,” said one resident.

The meters have been in place for two months of thesix month pilot program. The city will continue to collect datato see if the meters are a good fit for the community.