Increased parking fee will fund low-income transit trips

Motorists returning to downtown after the July 4th holiday will notice a change when they pay for street parking: The price is up 20 cents everywhere.

The Portland Bureau of Transportation says it’s a “climate fee” meant to remind people “of the external costs of driving (including greenhouse gas emissions, traffic congestion, and road space use).”

Even by domestic actions, this is an unusually directed reprimand to drivers. But cities across the country are up to the task of crafting policies to offset climate change, thanks to the US Supreme Court stripping the federal government of its tools, such as New York times I mentioned last week.

The fee was the brainchild of a city task force, which met for a year to find ways to “address the climate crisis by reducing driving, while also addressing historical inequalities in our transportation system,” says PBOT spokeswoman Hannah Schaeffer.

The Portland City Council agreed to the task force’s recommendations in October and directed the Transit Bureau to develop and implement appropriate strategies. The parking fee, which the task force described as a “near-term solution,” is the first of those recommendations to go into effect, but Schaefer says more is on the way.

Where does the money go? Schaefer says the bureau expects to raise $2 million in the first year, and using that money provides transit passes for people who live in affordable housing and gives Pickettown rides to people receiving social services.

City Hall has not created exemptions for low-income drivers – although the task force has suggested trying. An economic crisis, like the one that inflation is causing now, says Schaeffer, is “a time when people start to rethink how they travel because of prices. We’re really excited to be able to give people more choices now than we did. [in 2008] To enable them to choose options other than driving.”