a214  1207  04 Nov 88
AM-Boston Parking, Bjt,0646
Boston Seeks Thaw of 15-Year-Old Parking Freeze
By ALAN COOPERMAN
Associated Press Writer
    BOSTON (AP) - Ten years ago, when Bob Beal paid $7,500 for a parking
space on tony Beacon Hill, some of his friends thought he was nuts.
    But this year, two spots in the same garage changed hands for
$135,000 each - and 10 more buyers put their names on a waiting list.
So who's nuts now?
    ''I'd say it looks like it was a pretty good investment,'' Beal
said. ''Wouldn't you?''
    Of course, not all parking in this city is so expensive. A space in
the garage under the Boston Common goes for $110 a month. All you
have to do is sign up and wait your turn - which, at the present
rate, would come in about seven years, according to the state agency
that runs the 1,500-car garage.
    While prices on Beacon Hill and the wait at the Common may be
extreme examples, there is no question that parking has become
expensive, time-consuming and frustrating in downtown Boston.
    On an average day, according to a recent study by the city's
transportation department, 99 percent of the spaces in the financial
district are filled by 10 a.m. By noon, the occupancy rate rises to
102 percent - the extra 2 percent reflecting illegally parked
vehicles.
    While many major cities have similar problems, Boston's is
particularly acute, because the parking supply has been frozen since
1973, when the federal Environmental Protection Agency and a state
environmental agency set a cap of 35,500 spaces in an effort to
control smog.
    Only a few cities have such caps - others include neighboring
Cambridge and Portland, Ore. - and in the face of public
exasperation, the city is preparing to seek a partial reprieve.
    Early next year, said Transportation Commissioner Richard A. Dimino,
the city will present a plan calling for the addition of 5,000
spaces.
    In addition, the city is trying to encourage car and van pools by
reserving spaces for them in municipal garages. And it is looking to
build new garages in outlying areas.
    To get the new spaces, Boston will have to prove to the
environmental agencies that lifting the cap ''would not make the air
quality situation any worse, and, preferably, would make an
improvement,'' said Barbara Kwetz, a state air pollution regulator.
    To a large extent, Boston's parking problem is a matter of simple
geography: Downtown covers less than 2 square miles, and is bound by
Boston Harbor to the west and the Charles River to the north and
east.
    But the crunch also has been exacerbated by a building boom in which
high-rent office buildings have drawn more workers and, in some
cases, supplanted parking lots or garages.
    City officials contend that there is no lack of parking enforcement.
Boston's corps of parking officers has jumped almost 50 percent in
the last year, from 65 to 95, and the city has been issuing tickets
at the rate of 150,000 a month.
    Still, a $15 ticket can seem cheap compared to the price of parking
in a garage. According to the transportation department, the average
hourly rate across the city is $3.60, but in some areas, like the
Back Bay, it goes as high as $6.
    Already, several of the city's largest companies - including New
England Telephone, Fidelity Investments and the Bank of Boston -
formed an organization named Friends of Post Office Square that broke
ground last month for a 1,400-car underground garage in the heart of
the financial district.
    A good measure of the value of downtown parking was provided by the
organization's sale of 450 shares of preferred stock in the garage.
Each share entitles the owner to rent a space in the garage for the
regular monthly fee, expected to be about $340.
    All 450 shares were sold in advance - for $65,000 each.
    
 
AP-NY-11-04-88 1449EST
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