ST. AUGUSTINE, Fla. — Parking in St. Augustine is just hard. Now the city is actually considering dropping its parking prices at the garage.
Matt Forrest of Jacksonville visited St. Augustine on Monday.
"It's tough," he said. "We thought coming here on a Monday would be a little easier, but it wasn't. "
Forrest brought guests to tour the Old City, and he toured the parking lot by the Castillo de San Marcos for a while in his car.
"Yeah, we went around probably four or five times," he laughed.
When it comes to parking, many people will drive around a parking lot or the downtown area in circles, looking for an open parking space.
When that happens, traffic on the streets can get congested.
So the St. Augustine City Commission is looking at ways to lure more people off the streets and into the city's parking garage. The way to do that -- lower the cost.
Right now, it costs a flat rate of $15 to park in the garage. The city is considering charging by the hour, so it would be $2 an hour and no more than $15 a day. Option B is to lower it to $15 during the day and $5 overnight.
For city residents, the proposed price is even lower. Instead of a $3 flat rate at the garage with the Park Now card, the proposed discounted costs would be 50 cents an hour and $2 a day. Option B would be $2 during the day and free at night for city residents.
If the city chooses option A, it would mean more than $280,000 less in city revenue, so the city commission has to decide if bringing in less money is worth having traffic move more smoothly downtown.
The changes at the garage are part of a bigger proposed plan to change parking enforcement in the city.