East Yorkers may soon have to embrace a new way of street parking.
City council has put forward a report that will make it mandatory for all residents and visitors who choose to park on the street at night to obtain a parking permit or risk being ticketed.
The current bylaw allows for cars to be parked for a maximum of three hours. However, people leave their cars parked for longer because the bylaw isn’t enforced at night, said Ward 31 Beaches-East York councillor Janet Davis.
Getting a permit “gives (people) the ability to park without being ticketed, and certain areas of (the) street are considered public, so overnight they get preferred parking when they get a permit.”
Davis said the changes will help expand the availability of on-street parking, especially for areas that don’t have access to it.
“This is a legacy from old municipalities, and there are larger areas in the city that don’t have permit parking,” she said. “(It) should apply to all over the city. I think that would make it fair.”
But obtaining a permit doesn’t necessarily mean that permit-holders won’t be ticketed.
When Richelle Lloyd’s boyfriend lived in his former East York home, she saw him getting ticketed “two or three times a month,” regardless of purchasing a permit.
She also says that it is sometimes challenging to get a permit in the first place.
But Lloyd does say there are pros to the potential changes.
People who purchase permits will be able to park on the street, as new bylaws may create more enforcement and therefore more room to do so.
This is something Lloyd’s boyfriend had trouble with. On weekends, Lloyd said, he would have to pay to park his car at a local Sobeys because people had friends and family over who would park on the street. This, she said, is especially true on small streets.
“There are so many houses,” she said. “There aren’t many spots, and some houses don’t even have parking.”
It is not clear how much the new parking permits will cost.
Residents shouldn’t expect swift changes. Consultations will be held with East York residents in the near future and a final report will be put forward in 2019.