Aspen’s parking czar walks back restrictions in popular neighborhood
Anna Stonehouse/The Aspen Times
Four-hour parking restrictions in the Hunter Creek neighborhood likely will get lifted this week and be replaced with a three-day, park-for-free zone.
Mitch Osur, director of the city of Aspen Parking Department, said he plans to present the change to City Council on Tuesday night.
If council agrees, “starting on Monday, we’re going back to 72 hours,” he said.
Osur said Monday he received too much criticism from residents in the area when he took away the 24-hour parking and restricted it to four hours Oct. 1 as a 90-day test.
“We listened and we know we moved too many cars up there,” he said. “We turned the heat up too much.”
Osur was attempting to combat the congestion on Lone Pine Road, which has become a place where commuters and skiers park their cars and head into town.
That didn’t leave enough room for residents in the Lone Pine, Common Ground, Hunter Longhouse and Hunter Creek complexes to park in the 33 spots on the street.
So they will likely get a reprieve until the spring, when the area may end up becoming another enforced residential zone where people are required to pay $8 a day and residents get a permit to park.
Osur said streets such as Park and Midland avenues could also become enforced residential parking zones.
“We have to do something up there,” Osur said, adding there are too many cars parked in that east end neighborhood.
