KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — A survey that "gauges the benefits of the current Free Nights and Weekend policy" in downtown Knoxville is making its way around social media.
The survey wasn't created by the city of Knoxville but by the Downtown Merchants Group, which consists of downtown Knoxville business owners.
"A lot of the merchants though, didn't feel like they were really getting a seat at the table and wanted to make sure that their input was heard," said Scott Schimmel, the co-owner of Bliss and a member of the Downtown Merchants Group.
Currently, Knoxville allows free parking in city-owned garages on weekends and after 6 p.m. on weekdays. The city has not said it's taking free parking away, but Schimmel says if they decide to, it will do more harm than good.
"It'll be more difficult to park," said Schimmel. "I think that'll give people a reason to perhaps not travel downtown because there are plenty of places in Knoxville that people could go and not have to pay for parking. So that's that's one of the issues, but then also our employees. They really, you know, it would be tough for them to have to pay an extra $2, $3, now while they're working, to park while they're working. Being able to offer a place to work where employees can afford to park, it would really hurt the retention of employees if we got rid of free weekends and free nights."
John Dings said he only comes downtown when he attends concerts at Visit Knoxville. He said the lot he normally parks in beside the building is now only offering parking for 30 minutes so he had to park farther than normal.
"Well, they gave you a pass inside the visitor center for 30 minutes, when you're there to see a show for an hour," said Dings. "And you're there early on top of that, and so 30 minutes isn't helpful. So I asked why that is, because it didn't used to be that way. And they said, 'Well, it's the parking lots are owned by TVA. And they only want to provide free parking for people that are in and out.'"
He said it's not so bad paying for parking.
"Well, it's not terrible," said Dings. "It's just a lot less convenient than he used to be."
David DaSilva said he works downtown, so his job pays for his parking when he's working. He said if free downtown parking went away, he'd just park somewhere else.
"I would probably park further out of the city," said DaSilva. "I know there was efforts to pilot a driverless Gay Street. And I didn't get to make it out for those nights. But I think the less cars, the less amount of cars would make it much better. As far as free parking goes. I think I remember back when all of it was free parking. So when they put up the parking meters it was it was less of a reason to go downtown, I think maybe."
DaSilva says he would be okay if there were fewer parking spaces downtown, to make it more pedestrian-friendly.
"I walk downtown every single day," said DaSilva. "So, it's it's quite enjoyable for me to just not have to dodge cars. So I would like for it to be more bike friendly, which would mean less cars."
He said Knoxville should consider more accessible parking downtown.
"As far as accessibility goes, having maybe more designated parking for handicapped or, you know, folks that would need assistance with getting out of their vehicle, making more of that available and maybe like stressing that would be the biggest priority for downtown parking," said DaSilva.
Schimmel says the Downtown Merchants Group plans to take the results of their survey to the City of Knoxville.
"I think it's just important to present that to the city and make sure that their consultants understand the impact of if we were to lose free nights and weekends, what that would do to not only the people coming downtown, but the people that live downtown, and also the people that work downtown," said Schimmel.
In Sept. 2023, the Knoxville City Council approved Walker Consultants to provide an analysis and recommendations for a downtown parking plan.
As a result, the city did release a public survey that asked about affordability, convenience, ease of location, parking location preferences, quality of parking options and wayfinding signs in Nov. 2023.
Eric Vreeland, Knoxville's deputy director of communications, said the city is still waiting on the consultant group's report regarding parking.
