Never Used Parking Spaces, Toll Roads, Airports and Dog Parks Bring Questions and Comments

The Never Used Parking Spaces: If you have been to the in that last two years you may have noticed two prime parking spaces that are always empty.  There are signs proclaiming, “Reserved for Carpool.”

Now I have been at city hall in the morning, in the afternoons and at night.  I have never seen a car in these two spaces. I started asking around with employees and found out at least two things.

During the Highway 40 closure in 2008 and 2009 some city hall employees carpooled due to the congestion on area roads.  But since December of 2009 there have not been any carpools.

The other thing I discovered is apparently no elected official or city staff member notice such things as two public parking spaces in front of city hall that have gone unused for two-years and done something about removing the signs.

I-70 Toll Road: The proposal to put a toll road on I-70 from St. Louis to Kansas City is more than a little disheartening. I always thought Missouri was above the State of Kansas that tries to separate motorists from their money while driving on I-70. Of course one sentiment is to have the people who use the road pay for it. I disagree.

We are fortunate that I-70 cuts through the middle of the state. People going from one side of the country to the other often use it, meaning they are stopping to buy gas, food and spend the night right here. They are paying all kinds of taxes, such as fuel taxes that go to road funds, sales taxes that go to the state and local communities and in some locations hotel taxes.

If you slap a 240 mile toll road on the map people will find other ways to go. Toll roads are a pain to get on and get off. People will take I-40 or I-80 across the country to avoid Missouri and Kansas.

Now if I-70 becomes a toll road, the first thing I want to see is the Mineola Hills flattened. I am tired of having to deal tractor trailers doing 90 MPH downhill and 15 MPH uphill.

Spirit of St. Louis Airport:  I have to wonder if there isn’t a yin-and-yang in play with St. Louis County auditor Jake Zimmerman staking out the Spirit of St. Louis Airport in Chesterfield Valley trying to find airplanes whose owners have not paid their personal property taxes. With airplanes that is a lot of money.

However, the airport is owned by St. Louis County. It seems there is a risk of running  plane owners who pay hanger rent and buy fuel to relocate to an Illinois airport near downtown where annual airplane personal property taxes don’t exists.

I for one would be more interested in seeing the plane owners pay their taxes. If they flee the airport the County will just have to downsize airport services. Before the county built Spirit the old privately owned Gumbo Airfield seemed to do alright.

BOW WOW…What was the city thinking?  Talk about poor planning! The City of Chesterfield builds a dog park that has 20 parking spaces and almost no parking on residential streets around the park. The city then sells over 1,000 passes to the park.  What a shock that there is suddenly a parking problem!

When you are building a park it is much easier to put in plenty of parking during construction. But once it is built if you want to add parking spaces, you are suddenly destroying green space and paving over the park. 

The city knew about limited parking and should have acted accordingly. Either put in more spaces when building the park or do not sell more than 200 passes then create a waiting list.  200 passes or ten times the number of spaces is a manageable number compared to more than 50 times the number of passes to the amount of parking spaces.