Five Times More Parking Tickets Issued on Main Street This Summer Compared to 2012

The new parking meters on Ellicott City's Main Street have resulted in about five times more parking tickets being issued this summer compared to 2012.

The county issued 2,568 tickets for meter violations on Main Street during the months of June, July and August this year compared with 526 tickets issued during the same months in 2012.

June accounted for the most tickets issued with 937, July had 792 tickets issued and August had 839. In 2012, there was 151 tickets issued in June, 220 in July and 155 in August.

A Main Street parking ticket costs $25 if paid promptly.

At the same time, meter revenue is up significantly during the same months. In 2012, the county brought in a total of $10,236 in meter revenue during the three summer months, while in 2013 the county raised $41,334 in those three months.

County officials said the parking program, which included new digital meters and parking sensors that went live in February 2013, was designed to free up spaces on Main Street by keeping Main Street residents and workers from parking directly on Main Street.

“With the introduction of paid parking on Main Street for the first time, there will be some violations," said David Nitkin, communications director for Howard County. "And one unfortunate side effect of more customers on Main Street is more violations. The benefits, however, are greater turnover and access, and more business for merchants – which the statistics show.”

Main Street merchants have said this is generally what has happened, although others have complained that the parking system is hurting business.

Sarah Arditti, owner of Still Life Gallery on Main Street, said in an email that the number of parking tickets tickets issued this summer is "OUTRAGEOUS... worse than I imagined."

Despite increases in parking tickets during the spring as well, many businesses saw increases in sales from February to May 2013 compared to those months in 2012, according to sales tax receipt statistics provided by the Maryland comptroller's office.

In August, the county made all of Lot D, behind the tourism center, a free parking lot. Of the 594 spaces in Historic Ellicott City, about 70 percent of them are free to park in, according to county statistics. The paid parking spaces are located directly on Main Street and on part of Maryland Avenue.

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CORRECTION: The original headline of this article has been changed. The first headline said visitors were five times more likely to get a ticket, but as a county source noted, we don't have the total number of visitors to calculate that figure. We've changed the headline to correctly state five times as many tickets were issued this year than last. We regret the error.