City Council extends parking hours, designates grants for park development

The East Lansing City Council plans to vote on extending parking hours on the 100 block of Orchard Street at its 7:30 meeting tonight in City Hall, 410 Abbot Road.

Director of Public Works Todd Sneathen submitted a request to the City Council to increase the maximum parking to two hours from one hour on the 100 block of Orchard Street.
The request follows a Transportation Commission’s approval of a motion after members of the First Church of Christ, Scientist asked the commission to grant extended hours because of a lack of parking behind their facility.

“Our church on Collingwood (Drive) has meetings during the weeknights and, with only an hour parking, it’s not quite long enough,” Church member Rich Schaberg said.

The commission unanimously voted to approve the request and now is taking its recommendation to the council to be approved.

“When it comes to parking issues, it’s more of a neighborhood issue,” Sneathen said. “As long as the neighborhood is OK with it, it’s not really a problem.”

Other items slated for the agenda are three grants being offered to the Department of Parks, Recreation and Arts through the Michigan Department of Natural Resources, or MDNR.

The council plans to vote on granting permission for the department to enter a project agreement with the MDNR to acquire the funds.

The department applied for the grants in April 2008 for both White Park, located in the northern region of East Lansing, and Hawk Nest Park, located on the corner of Kiskadee and Buteo drives.

Two of the three grants will be used for land acquisition in White Park. The two grants total to about $500,000. Director of Parks, Recreation and Arts Tim McCaffrey said there are two properties directly adjacent to the park that will be incorporated into park land.

Combined, the new land would add 5.68 acres to the park’s property.

“The property will be initially just held as park property with no specific development plans,” McCaffrey said.

The other grant, slated for Hawk Nest Park, would go toward development projects such as a new picnic pavilion and playground for children. The grant total is $262,500.