Welcome to downtown Evanston, the dining capital of the North Shore. We hope you enjoy your meal at one of our more than 60 culturally diverse restaurants.
But don’t forget to throw a few quarters in the meter.
And in two hours, when you are in the middle of your meal after shopping on Sherman Avenue, please walk back to your car and move it to another spot. You wouldn’t want a parking ticket — or a tow.
We value your visit to Evanston as much as the businesses that will benefit from your money. But parking is sparse along downtown streets, and we have bills to pay — lots of them.
So that’s why metered parking no longer will be free after 6 p.m. later this month. We decided to extend meter hours to 9 p.m. Don’t worry — Sundays are still free.
And rest assured, dear visitor: We were thinking only of you.
With free parking it was too difficult for restaurant customers and shoppers to find spots along downtown streets in the evening. There were just too many people downtown. But with a small premium on the spots, there will be more parking available just for you.
Our decision most definitely was not based on the $242,000 a year we’ll get in extra quarters and parking tickets. We’re hiring more enforcement officers and buying more enforcement vehicles, but that doesn’t mean we are planning to profit.
Of course, the increased revenue from meters — and the lucrative tickets paid by scofflaws who can’t sprint to their cars before parking enforcement shows up — will be helpful.
After all, we have trouble balancing the city’s budget on a yearly basis. Last year we prayed for help as we stared down the barrel of a $4 million deficit, and this year we’ll face a $3 million shortfall.
The property tax base in Evanston is tragically stunted — thanks, in whole, to certain neighbors who would (if they had any sense of justice) contribute millions of dollars a year to the city. But certain neighbors do not contribute and, as a result, Evanston consistently falls short of the break-even point. Every year.
But we don’t want to confuse you with specifics, dear visitor.
Thank you for coming to Evanston. We have a lot to offer, and it is important that you find affordable parking as you visit our restaurants, our 18-screen movie theater and our independent shops that make us distinct from your usual suburban shopping mall.
Four quarters is a small price to pay for two hours of parking, even though you easily could visit one of those chain restaurants surrounded by a open pasture of parking spots at Old Orchard or hundreds of other places in the north suburbs.
Besides, parking isn’t so bad for our visitors — especially compared to those who live downtown and must pay more than $70 a month for a place to put their car.
Even then, it’s not so bad. What’s $70 when a monthly parking permit in downtown Chicago averages $238 and New Yorkers in Midtown Manhattan plunk down $450?
With the impending destruction of the Sherman Avenue garage and its 660 parking spots in January, dear visitor, you will thank us for the longer meter hours.
You will enjoy the peace and quiet in the previously bustling downtown Evanston at dinner time — when we’ll be eating at the parking-rich Chili’s Bar and Grill on Touhy Avenue in Skokie.
Deputy City Editor Jon Murray is a Medill senior. He can be reached at [email protected].