KALAMAZOO, Mich. — Parking at the Kalamazoo Mall will look a lot different. Pretty soon drivers will have to pay for parking.
"I'm looking forward to the parking kiosks coming," said Becky Bill, owner of Pop City Popcorn.
According to city officials, paying to park at the mall will increase turnover for spaces. Bill told FOX 17 she agrees.
"I'm looking out my front window, and there's the same work truck that's been there for two days straight," she said.
Currently, the mall has 90-minute free parking. For some business owners, it can be a nuisance. "If a vehicle is taking up a parking space or two for two days or three hours or longer, then it discourages people from stopping," Bill told FOX 17.
According to Deputy Director of Community Planning Christina Anderson, the city will be installing a parking kiosk on each block of the mall.
"We hope to have those installed either the very end of August or early September," Anderson said.
The kiosks will be placed between Michigan going all the way down to Lovell.
"By regulating the parking in this way, we're again creating turnover, creating certainty of some number of available spaces on the street," she said.
On Monday, the city commission approved an update to the parking ordinance, which allows the rate to increase from $1.75 to $2.
"The parking system financially is struggling a bit, and so, you know, these rate changes were kind of a minimum change that we felt that we could make to start to bring the system closer into fiscal health," she said.
The rate will only be for mall parking. Meters will be enforced from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m.
Free parking isn't going away entirely; there will still be free 90-minute parking on the ramp.
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