Campy's Editorial Page 

Coming soon, to a parking meter (or two) near you.

March 20, 2000

An open letter to City Council:

    Once again, it is springtime in Cincinnati.  Birds are singing, flowers (much like orange barrels) are beginning to sprout up all around our beautiful city.  Things that are old have become new again, which is a wonderful thing.  Unless, of course, you are a merchant in the downtown 4th Street Business District.  If you are, than so far all that spring has brought is renewed harassment by the city's Parking Division.

    As many people know, we at Campanello's have been active in working with our City Council to find a agreeable solution to the parking crunch our neighborhood has felt due to the various construction projects, such as the new football stadium and Ft. Washington Way 2000.  About a year and a half ago, we sat down with representatives from the city, as well as the other businesses in our neighborhood, and worked out the best possible solution to the crisis, considering the resources that were available.  It wasn't what we wanted, but we were willing to compromise, and so was the city.  That all stopped about two weeks ago.

    In Cincinnati, it is illegal to re-feed parking meters without moving your vehicle.  This is a law that one Clifton grandmother found out the hard way a few years back, but local parking services personnel were reluctant to enforce it downtown because of our unique situation.  You see, with us being located right next to a major fire station, as well as being so close to the stadium and highway construction, there are not enough monthly parking spots available in our neighborhood to go around between local businesses and construction workers.  Suddenly, the city has decided to start aggressively enforcing the law prohibiting re-feeding meters.  Having purchased as many pre-paid spots as we could, we still have days where some of our staff, as well as other hard-working people in our neighborhood, must park at the meters (which have a max. 2 hour time limit.)  We do have a lane in the middle of Central Avenue available to us during the evening, but during the time when the parking meters are being enforced this lane is restricted to city vehicles only.  However, as you can see by pictures that are attached to this letter, city vehicles are also occupying spots at parking meters as well, but if you look closely at some of the pictures, you'll notice that only certain cars have received tickets.  Can you guess which vehicles belong to city workers, and which ones don't?  I bet you can.  At least the people around our neighborhood are putting money in these meters, while city cars (as well as personal vehicles of city workers, who get special passes) don't even do that.

      The point of this letter is not to bicker with the city, the fire department, or to point fingers at anyone.  The law against re-feeding parking meters may be utterly ridiculous (especially given our current situation) but it is still the law, and we must respect that.  Instead we wish to propose a new solution that we feel will benefit everyone affected:

    First, it has come to our attention that there is a parking garage located beneath the Fire Station next door to our restaurant.  If that is so, then why do the people who work at the fire station (most of them not firefighters, but civilian staff) need an extra parking lane in the middle?  Couldn't those parking spaces be better used by the city to ease the crunch on the rest of us?  We propose that the city workers be allowed to park in the underground garage, and that the center lane on Central Avenue (at least partially) be converted to metered parking.  This would free up valuable parking space for the downtown shopper who presently has so much trouble finding a space.  After all, isn't that why it is illegal for people to re-feed parking meters in the first place?  

    Which bring us to our next concern; where do our employees, as well as those of other local businesses, park our cars?  There is a small, city owned lot on the corner of 4th Street and Central Avenue.  There are currently 10 or so spots that the city sells for monthly parking, and the rest of the lot is metered, which is "enforced" 24 hours a day, seven days a week.  These spots (which are only valid from 8a.m.-5p.m.) are sold for about $65.00 each.  With the additional spaces created by opening up the center lane on Central Ave., the city could offer the whole lot as monthly parking, giving first dibs on the spots to local businesses and residents.  If they sold spots in the evening for the same amount of money they sold them for during the day, they could make far more money than they do now trying to keep it metered all day, every day.  Most importantly, everyone from shoppers, local residents and workers, as well as the city and the parking division, will benefit. 

   In addition to the newspaper, a copy of this letter is being sent to each member of City Council, other local news media, and we are publishing it on our website (www.campanellos.com).  We can only hope that this way, someone will finally take notice and put this tired issue to bed.   We at Campanello's are putting forth this idea because we feel it is the best possible solution.  We welcome any other suggestions the city, or anyone else, might have.  Thank you for taking in interest in the future of downtown Cincinnati.

   Sincerely,

   Matthew Dominic McGowan

    Ivan Bruce Campanello-Owner

   Campanello's Italian Restaurant

   *Guest editorial for the Cincinnati Enquirer

Previous Editorials

Cincinnati Convention Center (January 21, 2000)

Downtown Parking (December 1999)