PLATTEVILLE — A Platteville Common Council meeting without the subject of parking being discussed is like a summer without sweet corn.

The Common Council June 26 approved switching legal parking on Washington Street and extending the area where parking is prohibited on Adams Street.

Director of Public Works Howard Crofoot said parking was allowed on the east side of Washington Street, but not the west side, before its reconstruction. Crofoot recommended switching parking to the west side with the sidewalk being widened on the west side of Washington.

The council discussed changes to parking ordinances in two campus areas — near Ralph E. Davis Pioneer Stadium and St. Augustine University Parish — and inconsistencies in new permitted parking areas south of Pine Street.

District 3 Ald. Barb Daus, chair of the city Redevelopment Authority, reported on opposition to the new parking permits from the RDA’s parking open house June 18.

“Many of the downtown businesses, their employees, have chosen to park in those areas to keep downtown parking open” for their customers, said Daus. She said permit parking on Rountree Avenue and Bayley Avenue was “not a good idea.”

“There are people who want this parking taken away south of Pine,” replied District 4 Ald. Ken Kilian.
City Manager Larry Bierke said the official parking map is inconsistent with the text of the parking ordinance, which will require changes in the parking ordinance at a future meeting.

The council approved an intergovernmental agreement with UW–Platteville for parking permits to be issued on Greenwood Avenue, University Plaza and College Drive. The city will receive $20,000 in 2012, and will split ticket revenue with UW–Platteville in 2013 under what Bierke called a “trial run.”

The agreement passed 6–1, with District 2 Ald. Eileen Nickels opposed.

“I do not favor taking public streets and making them private parking lots, which this essentially does,” said Nickels. “If the university can request this, why couldn’t a new apartment complex request this? I think it sets a bad precedent.”

The Common Council unanimously passed a related intergovernmental agreement with UW–Platteville to allow UWP police to respond to calls at the new Rountree Commons.

Platteville Police Chief Doug McKinley said the agreement was “something both the university and the city wanted,” and added the agreement “should minimize impact on city services.”