LONDON, ONT. -- City hall is pulling the plug on an agreement that would have brought a troubled unregulated parking lot up to current municipal standards.
Located west of Richmond Row, between Mill and John streets, the lot was created by a local landlord for his tenants, but it’s also attracting numerous bar patrons looking for free parking until the early morning hours.
“I'm regularly woken up by people doing drugs, having sex or urinating on my patio. That is a weekly occurrence,” says Ben Benedict, who rents a house where the backyard is surrounded by the unpaved and poorly-lit lot.
“It’s just backyards being covered in gravel. It's not a parking lot. What it has done is its attracted a lot of nuisance, violence, and a lot of crime to our community,” he adds.
City hall had been negotiating an agreement with property owner Jason Sims to convert it to a municipally-operated and enforced commercial lot. The city would have collected parking fines and split meter revenue with Sims.
But in December, city administration abandoned efforts to finalize the agreement because a number of prerequisites had not been met.
A new report to the Civic Works Committee states, “Prior to finalizing a municipal parking lot agreement, there are a number of prerequisites including: site plan control (landscaping, access, storm-water management), lot administration and enforcement protocol which would need to be completed.”
“They wanted us to pave the parking lot and put in some more lighting, and we are not going to spend all that money and then they are just going to change their mind,” Sims tells CTV News.
He says that preliminary work to regrade the site has already been completed, “The process has taken a very long time. We've signed an agreement and now for some reason, and they won't tell us why, they've changed their mind.”
Orest Katolyk, chief municipal law enforcement officer, explains in a written statement, “If no agreement is made, the area will need to revert back to parking for the tenants of the adjacent residential rental units."
Sims estimates about 100 unauthorized cars park on the site daily, taking spots away from his tenants. He says a solution lies with city hall, “It’s out of control with the parking and it needs to be monitored with all the trespassers.”
North Talbot Neighbourhood residents, including Benedict, have sent a letter to Tuesday’s meeting of the Civic Works Committee calling for action.
“It’s not that the parking lot is not needed, it’s not done properly. The city has ignored this. Ignored our community.”
