Letter to the Editor – Island Eye News, May 22

IOP Parking

Another summer season is almost here and with it the tidal wave of daytrippers coming to enjoy a day at the beach.

After 6 years of planning on how to deal with this unsafe tsunami of cars, City Council has decided to do….nothing!  Talk and plan, talk and plan, and then talk and plan some more. T o be totally fair they have put up a couple of nice wooden signs with arrows pointing to the parking lot.

Council hired a parking consultant, Stantec, and paid them $148,000 (so far) for which Stantec held some meetings, took some aerial photos and did some car counts.  After this exhaustive research Stantec came to the stunning conclusions that a lot of cars come here in the summer, a lot more come on the weekends, and a lot, lot more come on holidays!  And, oh yeah, a lot of people have unlawfully put stuff in the easements.

Council decided to go with a paid parking system, but with no idea on how to sell the passes, how many passes to sell, how to price the passes, how to monitor the passes, etc., etc.  With so many variables to deal with Council decided to can the whole idea, step back, and do some more talking and planning!  Six years…

Now all plans have been postponed until next summer, and if the past is any indication of the future, it will be delayed next summer as Council tries to find the perfect plan that will make everyone happy.  It has been said the perfect is the enemy of the good.  This is so very true as we get ready to be swamped by cars while Council looks for perfection.

Isn’t it time to just try something, anything?  If it doesn’t work it can be scrapped or changed.  It is way past time to quit thinking and just try something.

Ralph B. Piening

246 Forest Trail