At Wednesday’s city council meeting, a review of the City’s minimum parking requirements was presented to council.
The review was in response to a motion that had asked city administration to look at the implications of removing minimum parking requirements on new and current developments in suburban areas.
The reports, which were presented to the council, outline three scenarios for minimum parking.
- Maintaining current minimum parking requirements of one stall per dwelling unit
- Eliminating minimum parking requirements
- Increasing minimum parking requirements from one to 1.5 stalls per dwelling unit
However, the council passed a motion to increase the parking minimums instead of removing minimum parking requirements.
Councillor Lori Bresciani moved a motion to have the administration report back in 2023 on the impacts of increasing parking requirements in certain areas.
She argues that Regina will need a more nuanced approach to address unique situations experienced by different communities in the City.
Mayor Sandra Masters says that report addresses the Greenfield sites around multi-family housing, not the whole City.
“I think we heard from two councillors, both from Habour Landing and the Greens, they’ve received a number of complaints for years about the congestion that is happening on the streets because lots are shorter and folks are parking on the street, or there is no back-alley access, driveways are narrow and tied together. I think what they are hearing from residents of those neighbourhoods and the nuance of that report is specific to Greenfield.”
Masters said that she would rather see them eliminate parking requirements to raise the minimum.
“I like the idea of having no minimum, no maximum, but then that’s not the intention for developers to use the street-scape as their parking answer, and that’s not fair to the citizens that live there. So there has to be a balance there. How do you solve the congestion of parking?.”
For now, the minimum parking requirements will stay at the status quo until the city administration returns with another report in Q2 of 2023.
