I spent the last 5 days outside of San Francisco with family, working and dealing with traffic/parking, I am currently on my flight home, and thought I would see if I could put some of my internal thoughts on downtown Olympia parking together in a coherent article.
First of all, for the last 10+ years of living on the Westside of Olympia, through owning a building in downtown Olympia to being a consumer in downtown I have always thought downtown Olympia parking was a negative influence on downtown commerce, possibly the top one. Over the last month, I have been interacting with more downtown business owners and realizing that possibly parking is not as big of an influencer as I once thought, or it is perceived by the consumer falsely, and after thinking back to some of my recent out of town trips I may need to adjust my downtown parking influencer knob.
My first comparison will be with San Anselmo which I just left. The town is only ~5 blocks long and most mornings while out getting my morning coffee shot we parked about 2 blocks away from the shop and walked due to a packed downtown parking scenario. Granted the sun was out and the parking was free however we did have to search for parking and walk 2 blocks – oh my! Not a big deal.
My next comparison is with a recent business trip to Portland near the Pearl District. It took me about 5 minutes of driving around to find outdoor parking on the street and cost me around 9 dollars, as I recall, for 3 hours of time. I ended up walking about 5 blocks to my meeting. Again the weather was great.
Now, when thinking back to my weekly or even daily trips to downtown Olympia what I realized is almost always I am able to find parking within 3 blocks of the location I am wanting to visit. I normally find a location much closer if I am not heading into the heart of town. The more I thought about my trips to downtown Olympia the more I realized that potentially I have been improperly skewed in my perception of downtown Olympia parking.
Now do I think extra parking would assist – you bet. Do I hope the New City Hall has a solid parking plan – you bet. Do I think a large parking area would add customers thus commerce to downtown – you bet. Would I like to see the numbers we get at Arts Walk roaming the streets each night after work and on the weekends – you bet.
To assist in solving this possible mis-represented impression by the consumers- business owners and employees need to start spreading the word that downtown Olympia parking is actually much better in Olympia than many other city locations and moreover it is good for your body to walk a few blocks a day!
Downtown parking whether real or fiction is an influencer on consumers thus effecting commerce in downtown but I believe there is more to the puzzle and we business owners through word of mouth can start to change the false impression that parking is a nightmare. Should we all not walk 3 blocks and probably more – like 15 a day? Some of the businesses in downtown are doing well? Let’s get some media and word of mouth going that downtown parking really is good for a city of downtown Olympia’s size. If you measure the walking distance from the back of a large box store to the back of the large box stores parking lot your total walking distance in downtown Olympia will probably be less? Challenge me!!
– Note the photo was taken at 9:30am on a Monday morning. Lots of parking!
