Save One Hour Free Parking in Downtown Parking Garages

The Downtown Windsor Business Improvement Association (DWBIA) implores you to sign this petition and help us SAVE the one hour free parking in downtown parking garages.

The City of Windsor eliminated the one hour free parking in all municipally-owned parking garages, effective January 1, 2016; and will increase on-street parking rates by $0.25 an hour this summer.

The DWBIA is strongly opposed to these changes for the following reasons:

1. They disincentivise visitation to the city centre. The free one-hour parking is convenient to visitors coming downtown for short periods of time, and our merchants find that many of their clients are more inclined to frequent their places of business as a result thereof. The DWBIA has already fielded complaints in this regard.
   
   
2. The free one hour parking also supports downtown residents who are utilizing the services of personal support workers, visitors and family.
   
   
3. The one hour free parking is an added bonus to visitors attending the Downtown Farmers Market and the many events held in the city centre and at Riverfront Festival Plaza.
   
   
4. Downtown Windsor merchants need the impetus of free one hour parking in municipal garages to help attract visitors, and the elimination thereof is detrimental to downtown business opportunities and quality of life.
   
   
5. These changes contravene the City's strategic vision of increasing visitation and foot traffic in the core.

Please sign the petition and help us save our downtown businesses! It is our hope that this petition will help City Council realize the potentially dire effects of their decision, and therefore consider the reversal thereof.

Thank you for your consideration and support.