Downtown parking regulations are loosening up in Cold Lake.
Small to medium-sized businesses and restaurants with less than 150 seats will no longer be required to provide parking in the downtown and lakeshore areas, after the City of Cold Lake council passed their amended bylaw on Tuesday, May 14.
The city had met with stakeholders and business owners in February prior to making any changes to the bylaw, offering three options for their consideration.
In the end, everyone agreed the less restrictive approach was best.
Coun. Duane Lay wanted to see their bylaw relaxed even further. Under the revised bylaw, any restaurants located in the downtown or lakeshore area with 150 seats or more are required to provide 38 parking stalls, with the number of spots increasing based on how many seats the establishment has.
Lay’s recommendation was to cut back on that number.
“Coun. Lay raised considerations for creating a pro-rated scale, in particular for large-scale restaurants over 150 seats,” explained CAO Kevin Nagoya.
His suggestion was based off of large-scale locations such as Earls or Montana’s showing interest in either the downtown core or the lakeshore.
He was concerned if the city imposes parking requirements for their 150 seat establishment, they will choose to go elsewhere.
“That might drive them out of there,” Lay explained.
Another consideration was the amount of people parking downtown and along the lakeshore after 6 p.m.
Lay said traditionally, “there’s nobody there.”
Although Nagoya agreed downtown parking is fairly open in the evenings, he was concerned Lay’s recommendation is “going too far.”
“On the other end of it, say someone is down there with 140 seats and wants to expand to 180, all of the sudden they need all of this parking and they’re going to stop the expansion,” Lay noted.
Nagoya said, “When we start to look at those expansions, they could lobby council and the bylaws can be amended even further to allow those things.”
“I think it’s something we can test, because I don’t think the market is there today for a 200 to 300 seat restaurant. I don’t know if the market is there anyways, but I can see it being there potentially for other opportunities and being able to address it in that way,” he continued.
Specific areas, such as amusement establishments, hotels/motels, participant recreation, religious assembly, and shopping centres are excluded from the exceptions.
Council passed the bylaw, eliminating the requirements for small to medium-sized establishments to provide on-site parking. Larger scale businesses, such as restaurants with over 150 seats, are expected to offer parking stalls based on their size.
