Cedar Rapids phasing out back-in angle parking

CEDAR RAPIDS - The city is taking another step away from its experiment with back-in angle parking.

The Cedar Rapids Downtown District on Thursday said that back-in angle parking along First Street SE from First Avenue to Seventh Avenue SE will change to the more-conventional, front-in angle parking this month.

The City Council earlier this year said it wanted to convert the city's back-in angle slots to front-in ones, and the Downtown District said that downtown business owners, employees and visitors also favored the change. The transition should be complete by June 17, weather permitting.

Vanessa Rogers, the district's vice president, said that back-in angle parking will continue on the Second Avenue and Third Avenue bridges, but the district's plan is to phase out the unconventional style of angle parking on the bridges as well.

The City Council voted to give back-in angle parking a chance in September 2008 after a city traffic engineer reported that accident research showed that back-in angle parking results in fewer accidents than front-in angle parking.

Jerry McGrane, a council member at the time, joked that he was willing to support back-in angle parking for the entertainment value if nothing else. He said older motorists, in particular, might find it difficult to get used to.

City officials in Des Moines said then that they used back-in angle parking on some bridges, but not along downtown streets out of concern that exhaust fumes from the backsides of vehicles would hit those eating at sidewalk cafes.

In the months after the June 2008 flood, back-in angle parking also was established on Second Avenue SE for contractors at work on flood-damaged downtown buildings. Those spaces have since converted to conventional parking spaces.