Downtown parking ramp rates set to rise

You were forewarned three weeks ago - monthly rates in downtown parking ramps are headed up.

The City Council this week is slated to raise the current $30-a-month ramp rate to a rate between $40 a month and $48 a month depending on the parking demand at particular ramps.

Hourly rates at street meters in the downtown will remain unchanged.

Doug Neumann, president/CEO of the Cedar Rapids Downtown District, noted that the City Council had voted in the past to raise monthly ramps in downtown ramps to $60 a month beginning on July 1, 2010. However, the council has continued to keep the $30-a-month, post-flood rate in place for now.

Neumann said the Downtown District is now pushing a “slower, phased-in” increase in ramp rates rather than jumping to a rate of $60 a month.

The City Council is in the process of handing over the oversight of the downtown parking operation to the Downtown District, a plan that for now calls for the district to take on rate-setting power. The district intends to use the private parking manager now used by the city to manage the day-to-day operation of the parking system.

The entire parking landscape in the downtown is in the midst of change. The city is preparing to demolish the First Street Parkade, which had been slated for demolition even before being damaged in the 2008 flood. It now is in partial use.

The city also is in the process of purchasing two private parking ramps in The Roosevelt block between Second and Third streets SE, both of which will be demolished to make way for the city's new Event Center convention center.