Council Approves Plan for $350 Parking Permits

Officials in this traffic-clogged city voted on Monday to offer parking permits for a whopping $350 for the rest of this year--increasing to $450 by 1993.

The “master parking permits” will allow holders to park in any space, any time, for any duration.

The City Council adopted the proposal unanimously, without discussion.

But community leaders are balking at the price and the notion of permit holders having carte blanche to park anywhere in the city for as long as they want.

Mel Fuchs, owner of Mel Fuchs Pavilion Realty envisions people with campers parked on the oceanfront for months at a time “for $350 and have a summer home.”

“It’s ridiculous. . . . People might pay $350 and then leave it there. Where are the people going to park who want to come down here and go to the beach, go shopping, whatever? I think it’ll hurt the merchants” near the Balboa Peninsula.

But Assistant City Traffic Engineer Jim Brahler said he sees the permits helping businesses because customers won’t have to dig for quarters anymore.

“It’s going to be a lot of money up front, but they haven’t got to worry about quarters for the rest of the year or meter maids.”

Brahler said the blue parking permits, which are now sold for as little as $64, were intended to help residents, by allowing them to park for an unlimited amount of time at spaces with blue meters.

But the permits are sold on a first-come, first-served basis each year, and are usually purchased by employers for employees, leaving residents scrambling for space.

The new permits would not replace the old blue passes. They would be offered to residents along with the public, and they would also give drivers a wider choice of parking spaces.

Councilman Clarence J. Turner, chairman of the Off-Street Parking Committee, which formulated the proposal, said the new permit is, in part, a response to people asking for a permit that would enable them “to park anywhere in the city at any time.”

The permits, which will be available in June, will cost $350 for rest of this year.

He said the cost, which would increase to $400 in 1992 and $450 in 1993, is “commensurate to what they would pay at any meter” over a year’s time.

Newport Beach’s population, normally 66,000, swells to about 166,000 on summer weekends, officials said. The city has 2,400 meters.