Parking gates to go up…eventually

City has delayed reinstallation multiple times

Today is when parking gates in La Crosse’s downtown ramps were supposed to be reinstalled.

Actually, it was supposed to happen last Monday. Now, signs in the ramps say drivers have another gate-free week of parking downtown.

Software and other problems, apparently, are causing delays – something parking utility board member James Cherf had to hear about in the media and not from city staff.

“Nothing has been communicated to myself or other members of the parking utility board to the best of my knowledge,” Cherf said.

The city’s parking utility coordinator, Jim Flottmeyer told WIZM last week that the gates weren’t going back up, because of the software glitches, but also because signs had not been made for the new rate increase.  

While Cherf, also the downtown city council representative, understands some city staff would like to upgrade the parking pay stations – they brought studied an alternative mid-May – he’d prefer to keep the system that cost $450,000 in place.

“I don’t foresee those being replaced in the immediate future, as a matter of fiscal responsibility,” Cherf said. 

The system is around three years old, though it’s only been in use for about two because of delays. The gates were taken down in February because of vandals and malfunctions.

“The equipment (itself has) not failed at an extraordinary rate,” Cherf said. “It’s the vandalism to the arms and, also, operator error in not having proper form of payment to exit.”

Parking was free for nearly two months, after the gates went down in February. Flottmeyer was hired in March. April 27, the ramps went to a three-hour grace period before vehicles would be ticketed – much like the two-hour limit on the streets. 

It was also around that time that the city council agreed to a reorganization plan that gave the La Crosse Police Dept. authority over the operation of the  ramps.

A month after that, the deadline to reinstall the gates changed from Aug. 1 to “ASAP,” as the city wanted to take advantage of Duluth Trading Company’s opening downtown. The spin from city leaders: They wanted to be sure there are a lot of hourly parking spots available for customers in the nearby ramps.

The gates didn’t go up, and the hope was to have them up by Riverfest, July 1 – probably for the same reasons.

The city loses about $10,000 a month not charging for parking.