Opponent calls for a summit on garage plan

Princeton University, downtown merchants urged to engage borough in discussion of alternatives to parking garage

By: Jennifer Potash
   All the players contributing to downtown traffic and parking woes need to work together on a solution, according to a leading opponent of the proposed downtown garage.
   Jim Firestone, a Vandeventer Avenue resident and advocate for a smaller development, wants to bring Princeton University, downtown merchants and the borough together to discuss alternatives to a downtown parking garage.
   The Borough Council is in negotiations with developer Nassau HKT Associates to build a 513-space garage, a five-story mixed-use apartment building and a public plaza and walkway on the Park & Shop lot and a five-story mixed-use building on the Tulane Street metered parking lot.
   The borough proposed a downtown parking garage following a parking study showing municipal lots and on-street parking at capacity during most of the day and evening. The residential and retail uses were added based on community comments at numerous public meetings.
   The borough’s downtown development plan called for fewer apartments than the roughly 80 proposed by the developer.
   Mr. Firestone and his supporters claim that is too massive a development for downtown Princeton. He proposes keeping the two existing surface lots and adding a small parking shelf at the Park & Shop lot. Mr. Firestone and a couple of dozen volunteers collected more than 600 signatures on a petition for a ballot question asking for voters to abandon the garage project.
   Princeton University generates a lot of visitors and many of those people park downtown, Mr. Firestone claimed.
   "The parking the university does provide is in a distant place," he said.
   Princeton University makes its parking resources available to the public during off-hours. The university allows the public to use its parking lots and garages after 6 p.m. weekdays and on weekends, said Pam Hersh, director of community and state affairs at Princeton University.
   "Princeton University as an institution is very concerned with maintaining the balance and vitality of downtown Princeton," Ms. Hersh said.
   And the university regularly engages in discussions with the borough over temporary parking measures, such as jitney service, and has participated in numerous community meetings regarding the downtown development, she said.
   Mr. Firestone said the university in some of its publications directs visitors to park in the downtown garages.
   Ms. Hersh said she could find only one case — the popular auditing program, where community residents, for a fee, may take university classes – in which students have been asked to park off campus. Most participants are Princeton Borough and Princeton Township residents, she noted.
   Mr. Firestone said he would like to engage the merchants’ cooperation in a survey to find out where the downtown employees park. This, he said, would help clamp down on meter-feeding.
   Earlier this year, the Borough Council said the local meter-feeding ordinance would be more strictly enforced during the garage and library construction period to free up the on-street metered parking spaces.
   Several merchants have spoken out against the downtown development, fearing the loss of surface parking lots will drive customers away to the suburban shopping malls. Also, some merchants claim the closing of the Park & Shop lot in July, coupled with the overall economic recession, has caused business to drop off.
   The Borough Council is slated at its Sept. 3 meeting to discuss temporary parking measures for the downtown, such as changing the two-hour meters on Witherspoon Street, between Nassau and Spring streets, to 30 minutes.