More paid parking at the beach?
We have a beautiful beach at Sauble. I have never had any principle objections implementing a parking fee system for maintenance etc. Vistors from out of town and local residents now pay $5.00 to park and get little else for this outlay in return. Is $10.00 justified?
Unless the collected parking fees are re-invested in tourist friendly projects along the beach, the proposed increase to $10.00 will do little to attract new visitors, let along encourage previous guests to come back.
I outline some thoughts on the subject below:
1) Parking fee revenues are to be treated as segregated funds.
2) Offer seasonal parking passes at reduced cost at merchants throughout the area.
3) Errect pavilions accommodating 12 - 20 picnic tables (individual usage, family reunions, company picnics, friend and family gatherings, etc.)
4) Provide steel BBQ pits at each end of pavilions
5) Designate (unsupervised) children's play areas (ages 3 - 12)
6) Provide conveniently located restrooms/change rooms including shower stalls.
7) Provide a designated (fenced) beach area for people with pets and provide doggie clean-up bag dispensers
8) Provide drinking fountains
9) Have covered refuse containers conveniently located along beach
10) Cabana rentals
11) Provide areas along the back of the beach for local merchants to sell their wares (other than in the main shopping area)
12) Horseshoe pits
13) Provide life guard assistance in designated swimming areas
14) Allow licensed food/drink/ice cream etc., vendors on the beach
15) Beach/park attendents with first aid training to be on duty during opening times
16) Post beach opening and closing times
17) Reduce the speed limit along North Lakeshore Rd to 15 Km per hour
I recognize that the above wish list sounds like utopia for our beach, but I just want to give the authoritie some food for thought. The suggestions should form part of a long range beach development plan which should be funded from parking fees and other sundry income. So far I have seen little improvement on the beach for tourists from the collected parking fees.
PS: This is being posted 3/21/07 2.00PM
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parking info
In talking to a few members of the parking committee I found that this is the 3rd year of a longer range plan. The 6th Street washrooms are being improved and almost complete as I write this note. Next focus are the washrooms north of Main Street with an estimated cost of $100 000. If you put the money in a segregated fund and you only have $80 000 you cannot go ahead with the project but you can if the money is in general funds.
You have some good ideas and I think you should forward them along with any questions to Bill Jones MPW at the town offices as he is a committee member. Did you know,for example, that in Wasaga Beach a yearly pass for residents is over $200 dollars and you are not guaranteed a parking spot.
I was also told that this committee moves in a slow, organized, well researched fashion so that the decisions (recommendations) made are the most effective in reaching the desired goals. Also, of course, the Town Council must approve this committees recommendations.
recalling our previous parking pre-thinking ...
... there were a lot of other fine ideas floated on this the last time around, way way back in the Land Before The Parking Time, all chronicalled here of course, in Sabrinus's posting called "Parking on the Beach?" ... gee, was it really nearly two whole years ago?
They didn't listen to us then either ;)
Parking-Your Premise Is A bad Assumption
Walteib what makes you think we want to spend hords of taxpayers money to attract tourists to the beach? Residents don't care to promote it only Chamber of Commerce types and they have only a hundred or so memnbers. The rest of us take the attitude that there will always be people who come to the beach without promoting it and that is fine.
Promote it and you expose the beach to environmental damage because of the extra people you draw. Taxpayers paid $350,000 for beach maintenance in 2003. Parking does not recover this. Why would somebody who lives in Mallory Beach want to pay for beach maintenance in their property taxes?
Barry Ross, President of the Sauble Chamber has policy out this year which says for the members to use every way possible to treat the beach as a cash generator for their businesses in July and August. Promote, promote, promote, use it as a cash cow and to hell with the residents. He has not made any friends. He has Friends of Sauble Beach ticked off as well. C of C want all parking revenue channeled into improvements and they still expect the taxpayer to foot the bill for maintenance. Barry actually boycotted parking committee because he couldn't dominate it and get his own way.
I don't want more parking on the beach it is an environmental disaster yet every year the C of C ratchets up the promotion and draws more cars and people in. This runs up the bill for services that we all have to pay. It is a creeping plague on our beach and should be stopped. One thing we don't need is outsiders who don't pay taxes here making a list of items to featherbed the beach with.
I think parking should be $15 per car per day with a season pass for residents. This will recoup more but not all of the taxpayers expenses maintaining the beach. It is still less than Wasaga. At least they are smart enought to recoup some of their expenses. Our C of C is preventing this every step and supported by certain councillors. The reality is they have very little voting power and we have to stop electing politicians who support them or in another decade we will need washrooms every 200 feet more policing and so on just for people who drive in for the day.
FOSB got a rude awakening this year from the C of C egocentric behavoir but you could see this coming. FOSB may be more involved in the next election.
Worst thing of all is Councillor Vukovic , a Sauble Councillor who wanted to be on the parking committee was purposely excluded.
I agree with Dodge Walteib
Improvement is all in the eye of the beholder. Few of the changes that you suggested will benefit property owners in SBP. The tourists that flock in don't pay taxes. They require services such as water and sewage that they don't contribute to in an equitable manner.
On top of that, the town ends up putting all of it's eggs in one basket. Many of the improvements that you've mentioned would be better spread throughout the town. This would reduce strain on the beach and allow other residents to more easily make use of the facilities. Oliphant could be a major wind surfing center. Set up the horseshoe pits and volleyball nets and take some pressure off of Sauble. The airport could always use a hand in drawing people to the site.
Lastly; since the latest treaty agreement most of the beach is now property of the Saugeen First nations. Permanent structures on their property or operation of sales booths could prove very interesting.
Dan O.
Beach Parking fees.
Always pleased when there is input. My whole concept of beach improvement would be based on a self funding principle using parking fees only. This is tourist money and not local taxpayer money. As it stands most of the funds become general funds.
Beach Parking fees.
Dodge, if it took $350.000. to take care of the beach (beach maintenance) in 2003, somebody must have questioned this large outlay. Were details available for public consumption?
That's a big junk of money.I want to stress again that only parking fees can be recycled for beach improvement. If there is a shortfall for certain improvement projects, then a higher fee may have to be charged or a project needs to be dropped. The many tourists who do spend money in town and around the beach shopping area are entitled to get something in return; not just the scenery. Do you kow how much has been collected to date and how the money has been spent?
Parking Fees
In my opinion $10 for a day of parking at the beach is not unreasonable. Try to find a place at Toronto harbour front to park all day for that price. Actually I agree with others who say raise it enough to cover the cost of beach maintenance. We don't need more tourists ... we need fewer.
kltpzyxm
CFOS catches on to the New Parking Rules
It takes time, but if you wait long enough, mainstream media eventually does catch up to the Peninsular: we see in today's CFOS News webpage some soundbytes of Mark Wunderlich on these new changes to the parking rules:
I have no idea what that last paragraph was meant to say, but what I do know is how the story focusses attention on the increased scope and price for the Paid Parking at Sauble, yet ignores the decrease in the restricted hours: parking tariffs are waived after 4pm! That's way down from the sunset-including 9pm cutoff posted on all the signs last year.
Most often, now that the kids can all make the trip, we do our beaching by bicycle, but for our particular use of the beach parking, the new hours are maybe not optimal, but really, only mad dogs and Englishmen dare out in the mid-day sun, and these reduced taxable hours now restore the honoured tradition of the icecream-toting sunset-worshippers. That's maybe not the same as a free pass for visiting our beach, but we get to park near the summer evening events, we can take friends down for beachside dinner, and overall it's a way better deal than the heap of thanks for nothing we got last year.
Some Interesting Facts
First of all, through a friend I was able to contact a member of the Sauble parking committee who has been part of that committe since the start. Mark Wunderlich, in his usual sound bite grab, has said he feels there should be no paid parking and / or residents should park for free.He talks about the residents on Lakeshore having to pay. Why would they drive when they can walk across the street??? This same Mark Wunderlich never attended one meeting of the parking committee. If he is so interested in his constituents getting free parking why was he not attending and standing up for those same constituents ??? Councillor Vukovic, after her election, attended the meetings and spoke her piece. Where was Mark??? I also read that Waltlieb has umpteen requests for tented areas, BBQ pits,etc ...but the beach is a park and as such has certain things that can and can't be there but it is enforced by bylaw--- did he ever send any thoughts/ideas to the town ?. With him its "you people do all the work and planning and then I will crap all over you as to what you should have done, but I don't volunteer, I just complain with no facts just dreams ". If you know so much Waltlieb then get involved by volunteering. Put your money where your mouth is !!! If your not part of the solution, you're part of the problem!!!
Thanks for your advice!
Hockey, did you get hit by a puck? What's my personal volunteering effort got to do with the parking fee issue at the Sauble? Perhaps you could offer some of your own suggestions regarding the future of Sauble Beach. I always enjoy a challenge to my thoughts, provided the challenger offers his alternative solutions. Keep your comments meaningful,cool and civilized. You might actually get readers to take you seriously.
Volunteering Waltleib
I think you missed the whole point Waltleib. The point I was trying to make was many people volunteer to be on committees, like the parking person I spoke to, do research, come up with ideas (the fees being one of those ideas) , meet and discuss these same, put together a plan, and help to get it in motion. These people are called volunteers--lots of hours,no pay. I know this because I have been on several similar committees. Then, when things move ahead, people like you and Wunderlich crap all over their efforts with your comments as to what should or shouldn't be, but never come forward as a volunteer. Thats called sitting in the weeds. This is me being meaningful, cool and civilized. Remember this variation on an old saying, "those that can, do -- those that can't or won't,complain." Do you get it now ??? Hear is a fact that came out of the research into parking fees. The parking committee member told me (fact) that in Wasaga Beach the cost of a resident parking sticker for the summer is over $300 and there is no guarantee of a parking space. How does that grab you ???