Parking at the Waterfront - Email from Robert MacArthur- Happy Canada Day?
The following is what I received in my Email today.
Like Ajax Home Week Festivities on the waterfront, the Town of Ajax Canada Day celebrations cost many $25 to attend. Why you ask? Two reasons really. Firstly, not enough available parking at Rotary Park, and secondly, the failure of the Town to realize that maybe they should have turned off the parking bylaw enforcement, at least until the celebrations were done. So many of those that parked on the streets surrounding the Canada Day party received a $25 parking ticket. The Town’s web site stated that parking on the street would be permitted, but some restrictions would apply. Why have any restrictions for such a festivity? Accept for blocking driveways, emergency lanes, intersections, and such, why would the Town allow ticketing to be done for those just parked along the road to enjoy the Canada Day celebration. Even those that volunteered to help the Town out were getting ticketed.
If I was council, I would be embarrassed. Promoting and getting people to come down to join in the celebration and then to ticket them while they are there is ridiculous. I can just imagine if it happened to those that were visiting Ajax! Won’t they have a nice memory of us.
For most of the day the Rotary Park parking lot was either full or people were not allowed to park there. So where else are they supposed to park?
The Town’s web site was misleading and not detailed enough, and the Town should have had notices up in the areas people were not supposed to park on this special day.
Again though, they should have not been any ticketing while the celebration was going on. I hope all that received tickets fight them.
As Ward One Councillor I will do my best to ensure that this kind of mistake does not happen again.
Robert MacArthur
Candidate for Ward One Councillor
2010 Town of Ajax Municipal Election, Durham Region
www.votemacarthur.ca
Robert@votemacarthur.ca
905.424.0155
July 2nd, 2010 at 6:41 pm
Steve has to fund his “church - come - cultural arts centre”, lakeside pavillion no one wanted and trails no one uses somehow.
Karem: I use the trails for my bike riding because I am scared to take my life into my hands on the main roads of Ajax!
July 2nd, 2010 at 8:53 pm
You’ll use them until, after dark, they become a hide out for dealers and drunks (one need only check out the harmony creek bike path in Oshawa to see what an ill fated venture this is destined to be
July 6th, 2010 at 7:33 pm
This doesn’t surprise me at all. Correct me if I’m wrong but didn’t we have similar problems last year?. I guess we can’t take anything for granted anymore. Here’s my solution. Don’t go to anymore festivals hosted by the Town of Ajax!. Spend the day in Oshawa, Pickering, or Whitby. It’s only common sense that parking restrictions be lifted to allow parking on at least one side of Lake Drive and the side streets during a large event such as Canada Day. If this was a problem perhaps they could have allowed parking in the field at Rotary Park (the one located near the road leading into the park). It’s a wonder the by-law enforcement didn’t start tagging people for being parked more than 3 hours. They say they don’t target residents unless there’s a complaint but considering that the town encouraged people to attend this event, you’d think they’d bend the rules for the on-street parking.
So next year, go to another local municipality and enjoy their event. I know I will be.
July 7th, 2010 at 4:46 pm
As the Town’s Manager of Communication, one of my responsibilities is to monitor local blogs and online discussions (which by the way I support and encourage). However, after reading this blog entry, I felt compelled to respond. The discussion is very much one-sided, misleading and unfair to our staff who organize and plan Town special events.
The Town of Ajax takes great pride in the many special events it offers. Our staff work hard to provide quality special events for residents to participate in, celebrate and enjoy. In 2009, the Town hosted more than twenty family-oriented community events, breaking many participation records. The feedback from each event was overwhelmingly positive. To confirm this, 83 per cent of people said they were satisfied with the Town’s community events (i.e., Canada Day and Pumpkinville) in a recent Town poll conducted by Environics.
Just as an example, below is a transcript of a voicemail we received from a very happy resident who attended our recent Canada Day celebrations.
“My name is (resident) and I just wanted to thank you. We just moved to Ajax not that long ago. We lived in Etobicoke before and have friends across the GTA and I think you’re the only one who has organized Canada Day THAT well! We went to Rotary Park for the first time with the whole family and enjoyed it so much! You did an AWESOME job. Again, thank you so much.”
This blog originated from comments regarding the lack of parking at the Canada Day event. More than 7,000 people attended the event – and we only received one complaint about parking. We realize that parking is a huge challenge and that’s why we implemented new measures in 2010 to help the issue. Firstly, we tripled the amount of bylaw officers on duty to proactively assist people in high traffic areas, and secondly, we heavily promoted the bus shuttles. This resulted in LESS tickets being issued (only 40 tickets were issued, down from 80 in 2009) and more than 1,300 people took the shuttle to the event.
Parking restrictions are necessary for many reasons for an event of this magnitude, but none more important than for the purpose of public safety. The Town needs to ensure that emergency service vehicles such as Police, EMS, and Fire can access residential properties without being delayed. There was an incident in 2007 with an emergency vehicle that prompted the Town to post no parking signs along one side of roads. The parking restrictions were well-promoted to ensure people had notice.
Back to my original statement, I very much support and encourage online debate, and I enjoy being part of them, but I also think it is important that we have all the facts prior to making certain assertions and/or comments. I am always available if you have an issue you want to clarify or if you want background information.
Thanks for this opportunity to respond.
Christie McLardie
Manager of Communications
Town of Ajax
905-619-2529, ext. 3362
christie.mclardie@townofajax.com
Karem: Thanks for the information and next time I receive something that I want to check , I will contact you. I posted the email in it’s entirity as I am trying to give all the new candidates an alternative medium , I screen all posts and it contained no information that I would consider inappropriate so it went up as is.
July 7th, 2010 at 6:43 pm
It’s nice to see the Town’s response. But to state “The discussion is very much one-sided, misleading and unfair to our staff who organize and plan Town special events,” is an insult. My information was provided by a volunteer that was there. Apparently the News Advertiser will be interviewing that person, so there will be more to come. First hand accounts usually overrule anything else.
To have an event of this event that CANNOT provide adequate facilities for attendance is a shame. SM’s comments is what will happen. People will stay away. All the attendance and success in the world does not offset that attendees and volunteers were ticketed because there was not adequate parking. The testimonials and attendance number are great, but that did nothing to work on or solve this parking issues. The issue is even worse since the Town staff also stated they knew there was a problem fro last year. So the solution is to ticket residents and volunteers? Nice public relations. As I stated before, keeping things safe is of paramount importance, but allowing people to park on a street curb for this one event would have not have caused a problem. Even allowing parking on one side of the street would have been a great help. I know the area very well and it would have been fine. The fact that attendees and volunteers were not allowed into the parking at Rotary Park when there was space, is also a travesty, and further escalated the issue.
Just some common sense would have went a long way.
Instead of critisizing comments and information that wwas provided by residents that attended the function, maybe we should look harder at a solution so it does not happen again.
Looking forward working on this in 2011.
Robert MacArthur
Candidate for Ward One Councillor
2010 Town of Ajax Municipal Election, Durham Region
July 7th, 2010 at 6:53 pm
Just one final comment on the Town employees comment. How was my posting misleading?
Was no one ticketed for parking on the street?
Were people not being turned away for parking in Rotary Park when there was spots available?
Were volunteers not ticketed?
I will be the first to retract any statement that is false or misleading. However, since this came directly from a resident, I doubt this is going to happen. But I am open to any proof to show the contrary.
Rob
July 7th, 2010 at 10:25 pm
I don’t think anybody here is being critical of the work that goes into making these events possible. Aside from the parking situation, I think most people would agree that these events are very enjoyable.
It’s interesting to hear that 83% of people asked were satisfied with the town’s community events. I’m just curious to know how this poll was conducted. Was it conducted by telephone, internet or by regular mail?. It’s very possible only one person filed an official complaint regarding the Canada Day event. However, I seem to recall reading several complaints in our local newspaper in 2009 about the very same issue.
The main complaint with these events seems to be with the parking. The shuttle service works for some people but many would prefer their cars. Could we not open up the field at Rotary Park to allow additional parking if needed?.
July 7th, 2010 at 10:34 pm
Here’s another unhappy visitor…
http://www.newsdurhamregion.com/news/ajax/article/157867
Karem: The parking at Rotary is no where near where it needs to be , the main lot is the same size as it was when my son was still in a stroller. The grass area near the main lot should be used to expand the parking lot. There is a lot of room for open grass area. Shuttles are a good idea and residents should take advantage. Our family will go next year and see how it goes.
July 8th, 2010 at 12:10 am
The person in the news advertiser article is the person that contacted me. I talked to Cara today and she went down to the Town offices and complained and got the ticket reversed. But why did she have to?
Mr Hannon states in the article that because it was a holiday they beefed up by law to enforce the parking. My view is suspend the ticketing from the 10 am to 5pm time period.
By the ways, parking in Rotary Park itself was only allowed by a permit. It would be interesting to see who had the permits. Council perhaps? Maybe Town staff?
Let me end by saying in no way am I critisizing the town for the event and the running of the festivities. There is no doubt about the success. However, just because the attendance was good and they had some favourable comments is no excuse to ignore the parking issue. Having been involved in the Ribfest and Homeweek, I know what goes in to these events. However, I can’t allow myself to let go of the thought that more can be done to assist in the removing of the parking problem.
Robert MacArthur
Which, as a member of Council I would make it an issue.
July 8th, 2010 at 9:09 pm
Christie made an interesting comment about the parking restrictions and how it relates to public safety. She says:, “The Town needs to ensure that emergency service vehicles such as Police, EMS, and Fire can access residential properties without being delayed”.
I agree that public safety is very important… which leads me to ask one question. If these parked cars were blocking the route of police, EMS, and Fire vehicles and putting public safety at risk, then may I ask why weren’t these vehicles immediately towed away???. Instead, people enjoyed the event for many hours while their cars were parked illegally.
Karem: You make a valid point but imagine the outcry if the cars were towed! If only they would stake out the fire routes in the plazas I shop at and get annoyed at the cars blocking the way.
July 9th, 2010 at 9:39 am
Good point. But there were not fire routes, this was just parking along the curb of a street. A wide stree at that. Any car block a emergency route, intersection, driveway, etc, ofcourse should be ticketed. But simply parking along the side of a street does not affect public safety. Yes it was a no parking designated area. But again, for this one day, let it go. Also, the web site said “Street Parking Available, Some Restrictions May Apply.” All to confusing for most people especially when no one without a parking pass could park at the Rotary Park parking..
Shuttles are great, but they don’t work for everyone. On a hot muggy day I would not want to be taking my family in a shuttle.
It comes down to if the town knows this is a problem, then they should do more work to address it. It obviously is still an issue. There has to be a happy medium somewhere.