Now Available Online! Temporary parking exemptions

HELLO SPRING! It is that time of year where our kids come home from university, and we have guests over more often, or we need to do a little spring cleaning, clean out the garage, plan a garage sale or perhaps do some home renovations. However, you look at it many of us need to use street parking overnight more often the usual.

Currently, we have over 37 different reasons to give a parking ticket ranging from $12 to 100 dollars. One of the most popular is "No parking from 2:00 a.m. to 6:00 a.m." and will cost you $100.00. I have often heard from residents that having friends over or sealing a driveway is tricky when you can not park on the street overnight.

On Monday, April 16th Newmarket Council passed an ALL-NEW online system to allow for temporary parking exemptions. A temporary parking exemption will enable individuals to park their cars on the road only in areas where parking longer than three hours is not permitted. The exception does not exempt individuals from following all posted parking regulations, such as no parking zones, in front of fire hydrants, in a fire route or a bike lane. Council approved the use of an online system, making the process for requesting a temporary parking exemption easier and more efficient. Individuals can now request overnight parking exemptions by merely filling out an online application form. We have several areas in our town that by-laws need to focus on and I expect that this process will streamline their work allowing for more focus on other areas.

We are among many municipalities to have come forward with a tempory parking exemption process, like Toronto, Markham, Brampton and Vaughan.

Individuals will be limited to a maximum of 15 temporary parking exemptions per a year. Once an individual makes an exemption request, parking enforcement officers receive the exemption information in real-time.

For the balance of this year this option will be free of charge and will be monitored very carefully to ensure the program works, and our neighbourhoods remain safe. A fee for this program will be introduced starting January 1, 2019.  For more information or to book a permit, visit parking.newmarket.ca (site currently under construction)

I would like to thank Lesley Long Supervisor of Bylaw Enforcement and her team for hearing our residents and coming forward with a solution that is easy and fair for everyone.

By working together, sharing information, ideas and being engaged in our community, we can achieve results for Ward 6 together.