Cheer for the Holidays: Easing the Parking Problems
Friday, December 19, 2008 1:49 PM
This is the season for shopping and good will - and circling around and around, stalking shoppers to grab their parking space if you're at the mall.
For commuters who use our Park & Ride lots at Kingsland and South Point, you are familiar with the pain of trying to find a parking space. In fact, dozens of you have been parking illegally - on medians, on the side of the road, in parking aisles.
Here's some good news to celebrate this holiday season: METRO has added 130 spaces at our Kingsland Park & Ride and 120 spaces at our South Point Park & Ride.
"We really hit the ground running on this one," said Vince Obregon, associate vice president of infrastructure service development.
Obregon, our go-to guy for the design and construction of our Park & Ride lots, said METRO has been monitoring the situation and started implementing a solution to the overcrowded lots on Nov. 1.
"We re-engineered the parking spaces and driving aisles at Kingsland, and by doing that, we were able to reconfigure the geometric parking spaces to 130 extra spaces," said Obregon, "We took out an aisle. This was the most responsive way to get some parking relief out there."
At South Point, which serves the Texas Medical Center, more than 150 cars were parked illegally, according to an October report. METRO has a long-term operating agreement to operate that lot, which is owned by the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDot).
TxDOT had some vacant land to the west of South Point Park & Ride, so METRO used that to create more spaces.
"We simply knocked down some curb and put down some all-weather, crushed limestone material to park on. This is going to be a temporary scenario. We are 
currently negotiating with TxDOT to do a full build-out of the remaining property,' said Obregon.
The completed build-out will offer more than 300 new spaces when completed by the end of 2009.
The two parking projects cost $300,000. "For a cost per space, it was very economical," said Obregon. "The cost benefit is very high."
The construction of both projects was completed in six to eight weeks.
"We were able to respond quickly," said Frank J. Wilson, METRO's president and chief executive officer at yesterday's board meeting. "Even with fuel prices going down and even with our prices going up, there's still latent demand for transit."