New Buffalo to implement paid downtown parking
NEW BUFFALO, Mich.-- New Buffalo is moving forward with implementing paid parking downtown, but there is no clear timeline yet for when it will begin.
Right now, there's free three-hour parking in New Buffalo's downtown.
A local business owner tells ABC57 they've worked hard to make New Buffalo a destination for tourists, but now they fear the paid parking will keep them away.
"I feel like over the last five years, everyone has worked very hard to rehabilitate their buildings, start new businesses, and I feel like the city is working against us by implementing parking meters, like paid parking," said business owner Leslie Danesi. "We have had three-hour parking here for the last 10 years, nobody has ever enforced it."
Danesi has been in business in New Buffalo for roughly 35 years, she says. She opened The Stray Dog Bar and Grill with her husband, eventually acquiring several buildings along Whittaker Street on the main downtown stretch.
All the storefronts along Whittaker are filled in this summer, she says, a testament to how hard business owners have worked to build up downtown.
She worries this plan will disincentivize many from visiting in an area that can be hard to find parking in the summer.
"They don't want to feel like they're nickel-and-dimed from the minute they get up here," she said.
Here is a map of the proposed downtown parking area.
New Buffalo Downtown parking zone
City staff told ABC57 plans are underway after being approved at the May 19 council meeting, but further information, like when it will start, is unknown for now.
Proposed pricing is $2 for the first half hour, then $10.50 for up to three hours, maintaining that three-hour maximum.