Found Some Parking

Took Lucy Dog for her regular morning walk Sunday morning. As usual, we found ourselves downtown by way of Washington and Harris Street.

I took the opportunity to clear out something that had been rambling in my head for a long while.

Why can't folks park on the downtown bank parking lots during the weekends and evenings.

All together, the TD Bank (used to be First & Ocean, right), the Newburyport Five and the Institution for Savings have 114 spaces. Each becomes off limits to anyone after noon on Saturday when each bank closes.

What can the city do to open up those spaces? What sort of indemnity can we grant to make the banks comfortable enough to free up those crucial spots?

Perhaps the banks could even take the idea further and offer them up as fund-raising vehicles for the schools or other non-profits. Cheerleaders, football players or little leaguers could collect a couple of bucks from weekend visitors looking for a nearby place to park.

If we wanted to go a bit crazy, we might suggest the city and banks team up to add second tiers where appropriate thereby increasing the available spots (although I'm not sure by how much given walls, ramps and such.

The Daily News begrudgingly--and somewhat unwillingly--serves as the unofficial lot for the Liberty Street area. I know this can be a pain for the owners and workers at time, but it's an essential public service.

Perhaps we can work out a more official relationships with the downtown banks.