LaBonge Cancels Pilot Parking Meter Test

Councilman Tom LaBonge nixed plans for a parking meter pilot program along Riverside Drive Monday night after hearing mostly opposition from residents and business owners at a town hall about the issue.

About two dozen people attended the meeting at Campo de Cahuenga and suggested other ways to enforce parking along the busy street comprised of many stores and restaurants.

Initially, LaBonge wanted to install seven parking meters in front of his field office at 10116 Riverside Dr. and gather feedback from business owners and homeowners about their effectiveness after about six months.

But those in attendance offered other alternatives such as striping and boosting the presence of parking enforcement employees to ticket anyone who stays parked more than the allotted two hours.

"I really don't feel that this is going to be advantageous to anyone other than the parking meters making money and writing tickets," said Gail Roski, a 49-year resident of Toluca Lake.

Ryan Altoon, president of the Greater Toluca Lake Neighborhood Council, was also at the town hall and said the board of directors commissioned a study last year that found at least 125 parking spaces could be created through several methods, including utilizing rear parking lots at certain times of the day.

He said the next step would entail getting city officials, homeowners and business owners to collaborate on a parking management plan on what would work best for Riverside Drive.

LaBonge said he was willing to drop his pilot program in favor of seeing what the collaborative parking plan would lay out.

"The neighborhood council is doing a comprehensive parking study, so let's look at that," he said.