Parking meter fees in downtown Iowa City are likely to drop, just two months after the city’s first rate hike in a decade.
The Iowa City City Council passed its first vote to reduce downtown meter rates to $2.25 per hour on Tuesday two weeks after discussing the negative impacts of a flat $3 per hour rate. A small service fee is assessed on top of that hourly rate for residents who park using the ParkMobile app.
“We want people to see the street parking spots as the premium, the short-term parking, the first-class seat,” Councilor Josh Moe said at a previous work session, where the council largely agreed on the $2.25 rate. “We want people to drive to the parking garages. Whatever we can do to drive people there, we need to, so I believe that means we’ve got to have it be slightly more expensive than the parking garages.”
The gated garages will continue their first-hour free parking model despite the hourly fee doubling to $2 per hour alongside the meter increases in July .
The rate was raised to $3 to help offset the city’s new fare-free transit system.