From left, Crystal Surdyk, city principal planner, Kris Brown, city traffic supervisor, Tim Smeal, ad hoc Jamestown Parking Advisory Committee, and Sam Teresi, Jamestown mayor, with a new directional sign to find local attractions and smart parking meter, which will be installed next year in the city. P-J photo by Dennis Phillips

Assisting tourist and city residents find local attractions and providing multiple parking meter paying options will be happening next year in downtown Jamestown.

On Thursday, Sam Teresi, Jamestown mayor, announced that next year new smart parking meters and vehicular and pedestrian directional signs to find local attractions will be installed in the city. He said, depending on the release of funding from the state, the smart parking meters and directional signs will start to be installed during the spring with the goal of having them implemented by the middle of next summer.

Teresi said the smart meters will take coins, credit cards and a smart phone app to pay for parking. He said users of the smart phone app will be able to add money to the meter remotely.

He added the price for parking will remain the same, but there will be a small fee for the use of credit cards and the smart phone app.

The funding for the new smart parking meters and directional signs comes from a $400,000 federal grant, which will be allocated by the state, with a local match of $100,000 provided by the Gebbie Foundation.

In 2017, the Jamestown City Council approved hiring Bergmann Associates of Rochester for $72,000 for consulting services for the design of a project titled “Smart Tourism Transportation in Jamestown.”

One of the focuses for Bergmann Associates was to implement smart technology for the parking meters and ramps so they can easily accept credit cards or the PayByPhone app.

Teresi said $200,000 will be used for the directional signs and the remaining $228,000 will go toward smart parking meters. He said 200 smart parking meters, which monitor two spaces each, will be installed.

The origins of the new parking meters and directional signs started from an ad hoc Jamestown Parking Advisory Committee. In November 2017, the committee presented its recommendations to improve parking in the central business district to the Jamestown City Council. Members of the committee, which first met in July 2016, included downtown business owners, city administrators and officials from the Jamestown Renaissance Corporation and Reg Lenna Center for the Arts.

Parking solutions presented included converting all two-hour meters to three-hour meters; changing non-lease surface lot meters to 12 hours; convert the outskirts of the central business district, Fifth and Sixth streets, to 12-hour meters; and keeping all current exceptions, which includes 30-minute meters, loading/unloading zones and handicapped spaces.

Other proposed parking recommendation included no parking fee increases, which includes the ramps and lease spaces; and to accept more payment options by installing “smart” parking meters that would accept credit cards and the PayByPhone app, along with coins.