The Park City Police Department on Monday issued dozens of warnings to vehicles parked on streets in the business district of Prospector, a result of a tightening of City Hall’s parking restrictions that could impact an array of people.
The Police Department said more than 75 warnings were issued on Monday on streets like Prospector Avenue, Poison Creek Lane, Gold Dust Lane and Sidewinder Drive. Phil Kirk, a police captain, said more enforcement is planned on Tuesday and Wednesday. Warnings were expected to be issued on Tuesday while officers were set to begin issuing tickets to repeat violators on Wednesday, Kirk said. Tickets will be issued on a first offense starting on Monday.
Overnight parking has traditionally been prohibited on Sidewinder Drive, but there are new restrictions on Poison Creek Lane, Prospector Avenue and Gold Dust Lane. Officials recently posted signs prohibiting street parking between 2 a.m. and 6 a.m. on the newly restricted streets. Numerous warnings were seen on vehicles on Monday morning. The restrictions between 2 a.m. and 6 a.m. are similar to other places in Park City, such as Main Street.
The Police Department and City Hall staffers in other departments monitored the situation on the streets for months prior to posting the signs. Kirk said long-term parking on the streets has been problematic for years. He said some cars were left parked for “days on end.” That hindered City Hall’s snowplows, he said.
“The biggest problem has been snow removal. The cars get buried in snow,” Kirk said, adding it has been “extremely difficult to remove snow there.”
He also said the parked cars present issues for City Hall’s buses.
Kirk said signs were posted on both sides of the streets. They were primarily posted in the business district of Prospector. Kirk said the restrictions will also assist businesses in the district since vehicles will prohibited from parking indefinitely in places where customers could otherwise park. He said the restrictions are a test solution that is scheduled to last between six months and one year.
The Prospector Square Property Owners Association, a business group, sought the restrictions for several years. Alison Kuhlow, the executive director of the group, said there were problems with people who live outside of Prospector Square as well as businesses like construction and landscaping firms parking vehicles on the streets.
“You would see the same cars parked there . . . They would leave them three days or more,” Kuhlow said.
There was an idea to sell a limited number of passes allowing someone to park overnight at a rate of $10 per month in several nearby lots, but a program was not finalized, she said.
The areas affected by the new signs Prospector are seen as a transition zone between the largely commercial portion of the district, which roughly stretches several blocks inward from Bonanza Drive and Kearns Boulevard, and the heavily populated neighborhood of Prospector. Parking is tight on the streets at many points of the year as residents, customers and people staying in lodging properties compete for spots.
The issues are particularly pronounced during the ski season. Last winter, after a large snowstorm hit around Christmastime, the Police Department was summoned to assist as City Hall attempted to clear vehicles from the curbside on Prospector to allow the snow-removal access.
At one point, street parking in some places was barricaded and drivers were warned vehicles could be towed. The Police Department put orange warning notices on vehicles warning them not to park there. The police and snow-removal crews at that point were readying for the Sundance Film Festival crowds and some of the barricades were located close to important Sundance venues, including festival headquarters.