East Hampton Village will hear parking concerns and ideas at a forum later this month to discuss with the public everything from instituting a paid parking system to leaving things as is.
On Wednesday, village officials announced it has planned for discussion of parking regulations in the business center on March 22 at 7 p.m. in the Emergency Services Building meeting room.
"The purpose of this informal discussion is to listen to comments and suggestions concerning parking in the Reutershan and Schenck parking lots and on Main Street and Newtown Lane," the statement said.
The village faces a challenge in that parking is limited. "During the season there are about the same number of employees working in the business center as there are parking spaces," the statement said. "In addition the numbers of vehicles that enter the two 2 hour lots far exceed the number of spaces available."
Under current parking regulations the village enforces a two-hour parking limit in the Reutershan and Schenck Parking Lots. These regulations are in affect May through November. The board recently . There is also a one hour parking limit on Main Street and Newtown Lane. The Lots parking is available for a 23 hour period.
At the height of last summer, in August, 152,121 cars enter the parking lots. Other figures are as follows:
- May, 71,374
- June, 98,462
- July, 116,483
- September, 81,114
- October, 76,393
- November, 61,057
The village police department recently brought up the idea of using and then generates a ticket for those who exceed the allowed times. The idea was to try to cut down on a labor-intensive, and therefore costly, task.
While the village board is not recommending any alternatives at the coming meeting, they want to hear from businesses, employees and customers.
The village has already gathered a list of alternatives (available in the PDF attached to this article from the village) that range from changing the parking limits to a maximum of three hours in the lots to install a paid parking system.
If you cannot make the meeting, the public was asked to contact the village through mail or email with comments.
