Restricting the Standing of Vehicles on

Belmore Avenue near 31 Townley Avenue

Ward 14 - Scarborough Wexford

The Scarborough Community Council recommends the adoption of the following report (October 5, 1998) from the Director of Transportation Services, District 4:

Purpose:

 To investigate the need to amend the parking restrictions on a portion of Belmore Avenue.

 Funding Sources, Financial Implications and Impact Statement:

 The $200.00 (approximate) funds associated with the removal and installation of the parking/standing restriction signs is available in the Transportation Services 1998 Budget, Account No. 20000-70200-72260.

 Recommendations:

 It is recommended that:

 (1)the standing regulations identified in Appendix 1 of this report be approved; and

 (2)the appropriate by-law be amended accordingly.

 Council Reference/Background/History:

 As a result of a petition signed by some of the residents near the intersection of Belmore Avenue and Townley Avenue, staff investigated the feasibility of removing some of the parking restrictions on a portion of the road. The specific request of the petitioners was to replace the No Parking Anytime restriction with a No Standing restriction on Belmore Avenue along the north side of the street at 31 Townley Avenue. The complaint is that students from Wexford Collegiate Institute are congregating around parked cars in the area.

 Comments and/or Discussion and/or Justification:

 Belmore Avenue is a residential road located between Pharmacy Avenue and Victoria Park Avenue, north of Lawrence Avenue. Access to Wexford Collegiate Institute is provided at the east end of Belmore Avenue. A No Parking Anytime restriction along with a 60 minute weekday parking restriction is posted on the north side of Belmore Avenue and a No Parking Anytime restriction is posted on the south side. These restrictions were installed in 1971 due to employees from a local car dealership parking on the road.

 We reviewed the parking situation on numerous occasions in October and November 1997 and did not observe any on-street parking abuse. We visited this location again in October 1998 and did not observe any vehicles during the daytime at this location. Given these findings, we did not recommend installing any additional parking/standing restrictions. Under the No Parking restriction, even standing a vehicle is not allowed, unless temporarily for the purposes and while actually engaged in loading and unloading merchandise or passengers. Therefore, it was felt that the existing parking restriction would allow for effective enforcement simply by contacting the police. At that time, we recommended that "if modifications to the existing parking restrictions are considered necessary by a majority of area residents, Road and Traffic Services would request a petition from these residents detailing the particulars of the desired change."

 We have since received a petition, signed by a number of residents in the area, supporting the installation of a No Standing Anytime restriction on the north side of Belmore Avenue only in the area of 31 Townley Avenue. Any parking taking place in this area is obviously sporadical.

 Conclusions:

 As this No Standing Anytime restriction will only impact one resident, and there is the support of the majority of neighbours in the immediate area, we can support amending the existing signs to replace the No Parking Anytime restriction with a No Standing restriction on Belmore Avenue east of Townley Avenue.

 Contact Name:

 Bruce Clayton

Supervisor, Traffic Investigations, Works and Emergency Services

Telephone: 396-7844

Fax: 396-5681

E-mail: clayton@city.scarborough.on.ca