Edmonton residents have probably noticed some streets don’t get cleared properly during parking bans and the city says that’s because owners haven’t moved their vehicles.
It’s not a new problem but now, city council is considering ramping up enforcement by towing vehicles.
“We’ve had a fine for a number of years, we gave people a two-year grace period before we even started issuing fines,” city councillor Andrew Knack said of when seasonal parking bans were introduced nearly a decade ago.
Currently, when a Phase 1 arterial road or Phase 2 residential street parking ban is declared, the city sends out releases so news outlets can broadcast the information, notifies residents ahead of the ban, and broadcasts it on public signage across Edmonton.
Residents can sign up to be notified through email or text messages specific to their address. Notifications are sent as roadways are scheduled, in-progress and completed.
Once a neighbourhood is confirmed completed, area residents may resume parking on their roads.
Residents can also check out the Roadways Snow Clearing Map for the current clearing status.
In 2022, council voted to be stricter and upped tickets for those who don’t move their vehicles from $100 to $250, but Knack says there isn’t enough enforcement for the fine to have any teeth.
“We’ve got about five bylaw officers for the entire city. That’s not enough. We need to address that gap, we need to address that shortfall.”
Knack said Edmonton residents have had more than enough time to understand and comply with parking bans.
“I think we’re at the point now where everyone needs to know: you need to be off the street, if you’re not you should be towed.”
“There’s really no excuse at this point.”
Knack brought forward a motion to his colleagues on Wednesday to implement a towing program.
Council said most Edmontonians follow the city’s parking bans and the ones that don’t create problems for the rest.
“The thing is, right now 95 per cent of Edmontonians are doing what we’re asking of them. The problem is, even with five per cent of people leaving their vehicles on the road, that dramatically impacts the quality of work that can be done.”
“When we’re not all contributing to that, it means we all pay the price: both in terms of the quality of service but actually in some cases the price of city crews having to come back after the fact to tidy up and to do more work.”
At Wednesday’s city council meeting, councillors shared their frustrations with vehicles that aren’t moved during parking bans — sometimes resulting in city streets not being cleared at all.
“I had a chance to go out with one of our blading teams a couple weeks ago and you can see just how much harder it is for them to do a good job when they’re constantly weaving in and out of vehicles,” Knack said.
“That’s just so frustrating to everyone else who has done their part and then to see them not getting the service, I think they rightfully expect in our city, because of this.”
Knack says he would like to explore towing options that wouldn’t cost taxpayers any money.
The discussion will continue at a future council meeting and in the meantime, administration has been asked to come up with a report that includes an analysis on the city’s parking fine options and a strategy around key locations.
The city is also being asked to come up with “options/recommended path outlining additional resources to properly address the needs across Edmonton to remove vehicles on streets during parking bans.”
A Phase 1 parking ban declared on Sunday will end Friday morning.
Over the past few days, city and contractor crews cleared snow and ice accumulation from arterial and collector roads, bus routes and roads within business improvement areas.
“This was the third Phase 1 parking ban of the season and crews completed all priority one roadways within 24 hours as well as completing all Phase 1 roadways one day ahead of schedule. All active pathways were also cleared with the service level,” said Val Dacyk, general supervisor of infrastructure field operations with the city’s Parks and Roads Services department.
“We thank all the crews working 24/7, especially given the extreme cold this week.”
The city said it’s not activating a Phase 2 parking ban for residential and industrial roads at this time.