The city’s parking plan, up for approval Tuesday, calls for replacing coin-operated parking meters with newer, more expensive technology such as the ParkMobile app, which went into use at Century II last week. The Wichita City Council is expected to vote Tuesday on a plan to hike downtown parking prices and install new technology that would make it easier for the city to issue parking tickets. The Wichita Parking and Multimodal Plan would more closely align the rest of downtown with a recent change at Century II and the former downtown library, where the city removed its coin-operated parking meters, replaced them with a mobile-app payment system and increased prices by 300%. The plan does not say exactly how much rates would change downtown and where pay-to-park would be located. But it does say what the city charges now is too low and that the city should focus its efforts on the most high-traffic areas, such as Old Town. It also calls for the use of license plate readers and other technology to help issue tickets more easily. Any changes should be made with community input, the plan says. The plan aims to maximize profits for city government and downtown businesses through downtown parking pricing and enforcement.
Source: Local News | Wichita Eagle
