City Proposes Lifting Rush Hour Parking Ban

By Marcus Gilmer in News on Apr 10, 2010 9:00PM

The Chicago Department of Transportation has proposed lifting the rush hour parking on ban on 225 city blocks. Some of the reasons given include making parking available for shops, getting rid of outdated restrictions (such as those put in place for alternate Dan Ryan routes in 2006 and 2007), and even bicyclist safety.

One example is the stretch of North Lincoln Avenue between 2900 and 3260. It has a bike lane, and it's not safe to have a bike lane with rush- hour parking restrictions, because then traffic is flowing on either side of bicyclists, [CDOT spokesman Brian] Steele said.

"You want bikes adjacent to vehicles that are not moving," said Steele.

It all seems on the up-and-up, right? But Ald. Scott Waguespack, one of the few aldermen who bothers to call the City out on their shenanigans, is skeptical of CDOT's motives. Wags, who's been one of the few consistent critics of the City's controversial parking meter deal, noted that all blocks under the new proposal are also metered blocks and perhaps it's just a way for the city to raise even more meter revenue. Paul Sajovec, his chief of staff, told the Sun-Times, "We're doing a little more digging to see what is at play here. The whole idea of an arterial street is it's supposed to be a through street instead of a slow one."