6/23/14 - With parking in Downtown Brighton at a premium, two meetings this week will look for solutions. The Downtown Development Authority has developed preliminary recommendations for short-and-long-term parking, and the next step is to make the recommendations public at the informational meetings and to get input from downtown business owners and those who shop and dine downtown. According to DDA Director Matt Modrack, the city has about 600 spaces in city parking lots, not including on street curbside parking, and the need for more parking becomes particularly evident during the evening hours as Brighton has become a destination for dining, with over 25 downtown restaurants. He says the need for additional parking will even become more acute when Brewery Becker, Brighton's first brewpub, opens for the July 4th holiday weekend. The DDA has bought land at North and West streets for a possible future parking deck, but Modrack says that prospect is unclear. The city has estimated the cost at $7 million for a 191-space, four-level parking deck, which comes out to over $36,000 per space, something he says may be prohibitively expensive. The public meetings will take place this Tuesday, June 24th, and Friday, June 27th, from 8-9 a.m. at city hall. After that, Modrack will be available at his office to take questions. Modrack says modifications to the subcommittee's parking recommendations will be incorporated into the final draft. After being voted on by the DDA, the document will go before City Council on July 17th as a set of formal recommendations for a parking strategy, including enforcement, signage, and possible future city parking lot locations. (TT/JK)
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