New Castle Seeks Solution to Downtown Chappaqua Parking Shortage
New Castle officials are searching for ways to ease the parking crunch in downtown Chappaqua while hoping to avoid reinstatement of the fee for merchants that previously accompanied the granting of each permit.
Complaints have risen regarding the dwindling availability of downtown parking spots since the town suspended the annual $150 per space fee last year as a way to give business owners a break, said Town Clerk Jill Simon Shapiro, who handles the parking permit requests for the town. Starting last year, each business was granted seven spaces for employee parking but business owners still had to apply with the town to receive the permits.
While some merchants did not take all of their allotted spaces, the number of permits, which had previously ranged between 176 and 202 from 2005 to 2011 when merchants were forced to pay, has roughly doubled to close to 400, Shapiro said.
“We wanted the board to know that this was something that we didn’t anticipate and really we can’t accommodate,” Shapiro said.
As a result, there are fewer spaces available, particularly at the recently remodeled South Greeley lot. With the excess merchant and employee parking apparently spilling over into spaces that should be for customer parking, that will likely have a negative impact on businesses in a highly competitive climate where some storeowners are still struggling to gain traction.
Supervisor Susan Carpenter said it is critical for the town to find a workable solution since no one wants to see frustrated customers leave town to shop because of a parking shortage. She said the town is hesitant to reintroduce the merchant parking fee but hopes the board and the community can work to find a reasonable solution.
“We haven’t yet figured out the best approach, she said. “Obviously, we don’t want to see merchants filling up every spot.”
At last week’s town board work session, officials said they will also reach out for suggestions to the public and the recently formed Chappaqua-Millwood Chamber of Commerce in hopes that the organization and its members have some ideas.
Proposals that were floated by the town board at its June 20 work session included erecting a prefab parking structure on town-owned property near downtown and the Metro-North station that could be built within a few weeks or to ask houses of worship in close proximity to downtown whether their lots could be used on weekdays.
Town Administrator Penny Paderewski said that the town has done all the potential reconfiguring of spaces at the train station. Furthermore, if the town follows through on approving the proposed restaurant at the site parking will be needed for that facility, she said.
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