MANCHESTER — The continuing construction on Main Street’s rear parking lots is causing headaches for some local businesses, though owners believe the problems goes deeper than the paved surface.
Business owners on Main Street, including Anthony Kazakos of Antonio’s Pizza at 832 Main St. and Elaine Hatch of the Landmark Café at 867 Main St., said they have experienced problems with the street’s limited parking options for years now — the construction project is only exacerbating them.
The town in May began work on a project to reconstruct and redesign public parking lots in four areas in the rear of Main Street businesses for better public appeal and access. The lots stretch from Bissell Street to Maple Street.
The work was initially estimated to continue through next May, with construction in May to November and landscaping scheduled for spring.
However, Town Engineer Jeff LaMalva said Monday the resurfacing is well ahead of schedule and the project may be completed by the end of this year’s construction season, pending landscaping.
Kazakos said his issue with Main Street is the sheer lack of parking, with people who park for long periods in the on-street parking in front of stores.
Though there’s a two-hour limit on parking in the downtown area, many people move their cars just before that time limit runs out, Kazakos said. He occasionally hears from potential customers who decide not to stop for a meal because they can’t find parking nearby.
That problem has only been highlighted by the construction restricting parking in the area — sometimes he and his employees struggle to find parking at all, he said.
Hatch added that she’s noticing issues with customers, as well as frustration with accessing her dumpsters due to the parking lot work. But parking is “always an issue” in the Main Street area, she said.
Tanna Parseliti, manager for Manchester’s Downtown Special Services District, said that officials know about the issues with parking — which the redevelopment project is intended to address. She said that it’s been a long time since the downtown lots were updated.
Though the upgrades may not reduce competition for closer, on-street parking, the improvements are intended to make the parking lots easier and more pleasant to use, she said.
Parseliti said the work is being done in phases to minimize the impact on local business owners, and the Special Services District has been passing information along as best as possible to businesses, getting regular updates from the town and project developers.
Hatch and Kazakos complained about the district’s requirement that they buy monthly passes to park in the lots and the enforcement. Kazakos said he’s had to go to the district’s offices to waive tickets before, even as the owner of his business who has paid for the pass.
Hatch said she, too, has recently had issues with the parking passes. One of her employees parks in a nearby lot, she said. A day after that employee recently purchased a parking pass, that lot was deemed to have free parking through the end of August, but the employee could not receive a refund for the pass.
A monthly parking permit is $19, according to the district’s website. Tickets for exceeding the two-hour limit are $25, with a $30 fine for simply changing parking spaces in the same zone. Parseliti said the parking fee isn’t intended to penalize, and the waivers are intended to work through that.
She said she sympathizes with issues businesses have but also asks for understanding as they try to work through the project.
The refund couldn’t be issued in the case Hatch cites because the district still cleans, lights, and monitors the lot for safety, and parking fees pay for that, Parseliti said. She said she empathizes with the owners and hopes the parking lot project will improve parking for employees, owners, and businesses alike.
Hatch took issue with that answer, as she said her car has been hit twice in lots she pays to park in, and her employees’ cars have been damaged and even vandalized there without any response or monitoring.
Though things will revert back to normal when the parking project concludes, normal still isn’t good enough for the business owners, who said they’ve experienced problems for years.
Kazakos said the owners need more support. “As a taxpayer, we should get something from the town,” he said. “If it wasn’t for us, no one would come down to Main Street.”
