Trending
Council members will be asked to approve, in the coming months, at least $2.16 million for necessary work on the Cherry Street parking ramp and another $4.1 million on repairs for the Spring Street parking ramp. That's a hefty chunk of change for ramps with limited usage in a struggling downtown. It's telling that at the same time the city is discussing investing in repairs, the DoubleTree Hotel located next to the Cherry Street ramp is being placed for sale because Hamister Development says visitor counts haven't rebounded after the COVID-19 pandemic.
So we get why Councilman Russ Bonfiglio was among the council members asking if the city should consider selling the ramps or simply closing them down.
“It’s not that easy, I understand that,” Councilman Russell Bonfiglio, R-At Large, said. “But, if it’s going to cost that to fix things … if they’re in that bad of a shape, then close it down.”
We remember well the emergency closure of the Cherry Street parking ramp more than 20 years ago. Traffic in the former Holiday Inn was a major consideration in former Mayor Sam Teresi's plan to shuffle parking around the city to account for lease spaces the city was contractually bound to provide for the hotel. There was legitimate public concern over the closure of the ramp.
There hasn't been the same level of public concern over spending at least $6 million to keep parking ramps open. It's a sign of how much things have changed over the past 20 years. Even the possibility of closing part of a parking ramp so work could be done caused genuine public concern 20 years ago. That may be because the ramps aren't being totally closed. It could be that so few people use the ramps that the typical taxpayer just doesn't care.
We know that the cost of repairs is astronomically higher than the revenue the city receives from those parking in the ramps. If the ramps were a business they would have closed years ago. That would be the case even if the ramps were full, by the way.
Unfortunately, selling the ramps isn't a realistic possibility if the ramps were brand new, and it's even less realistic a possibility in their current condition. Simple closure isn't a good option either. Closing the ramps would punt the cost of repairs into the future, but it also creates legitimate public safety concerns if the ramps continue to deteriorate and someone is hurt when the concrete begins to crumble and fall. Jamestown will likely find itself paying for repairs to the Spring and Cherry street parking ramps because there is likely no realistic alternative in 2026.
But Bonfiglio may be right in the long run. Should this be the last round of repairs at the city's two largest parking ramps? Should the city begin preparing for a future without ramps at Cherry and Spring streets? Could the city get by with surface lots in the future? These are questions worth considering while the city considers more than $6 million in repairs.