It’s a narrow road to begin with; during downtown events it can become virtually impassable, particularly for emergency vehicles. And that concerns residents on West Street North.
At the August 30 General Committee meeting, Deputy Mayor Karin Terziano said she had received a letter from a resident on the street following the recent ONtour concert in River Mill Park.
“For this concert, the entire concert truck was blocking the roadway which brought it all to a head,” said Terziano. “I think the request in general is that we look at no parking on one side of West Street North. This is strictly an event-related thing down at River Mill Park, but when cars are parked on both sides of the street, they claim emergency vehicles are going to be impeded.”
A similar complaint about parking on West Street North was raised at a previous General Committee meeting following the Ironman Muskoka 70.3.
Town staff have been directed to review the matter.
Update: A previous photo on this post depicted King Street rather than West Street North. It has been updated to reflect the correct location.
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Coming announcement —
“The Town of Huntsville is no longer suitable for cars. We’ve decided that being able to park is not a right, but a privilege bestowed only upon municipalities wherein the local government has put forth any reasonable effort to accommodate these unreasonable stationary car demands.
‘Since we realised that parking was a major issue downtown in recent years, we’ve decided to ticket these “parkers” and remove several available parking spots that were in heavy use. We have also decided that since cars are no longer permitted to be stationary in the downtown area, we are going to double down on the closing of the town’s main parking lot beside River Mill park’, a town official was quoted as saying.
‘We really feel that it’s important for people to have events to go to when they visit, and we figured, what better place in beautiful, scenic Muskoka, than the asphalt paradise of River Mill parking lot?’.” —-
not a problem…. gremlins abound…leftovers from the summer traffic…
Apparently I had trouble reading a map that day. Thanks for pointing out the error, Bill. The photo has been updated.
Yes, typically cars are parked on both sides of West St North…those on the east side are actually parked on the grass shoulder of the road.
However, the photo shows the foot of King street above River Mill park, where event vehicles tend to park in the “turn around sections” of the road, precluding proper fire / garbage truck access. Vehicles also park on the grassed footpath between King and West streets north of the parking lot.