Where's the Parking?
Drones and license plate readers will be collecting data about parking availability on many El Cerrito streets in early February as the city moves forward with developing a parking management action plan for streets around El Cerrito Plaza BART.
Data will also be collected for other blocks near Del Norte BART and San Pablo Avenue to support consistency in areas where time-limited parking and/or residential parking permits are in effect, according to the contract.
The City Council voted to pay consultant Dixon Resources Unlimited up to $220,000 to develop and promote a plan to “modernize the city’s on-street parking program” in preparation for the planned development at El Cerrito Plaza BART and in support of the San Pablo Avenue specific plan area. The consultant's work will be grant-funded.
More Housing, Less Parking
At Plaza BART, plans call 743 new apartments to be built on what are now parking lots. About 740 BART rider spaces will be removed. A new BART parking garage will provide 145 spaces, so there will be a net loss of about 600 spaces. For residents of the 743 new apartments, there will be 266 parking spaces throughout the project.
To address the loss of parking spaces, BART and the city came up with strategies to keep access to the station once the BART parking lot is gone. One of the strategies is to have El Cerrito manage street parking in new ways.
Some details of this “preliminary parking strategy” include:
Keeping one and two-hour time limited zones with free parking
Requiring people who park longer than two hours to pay unless they are residents with permits
Identifying new payment and enforcement technologies
Under the contract approved in November 2024, Dixon Resources will conduct a parking inventory using drones and license plate readers (LPR), use Dixon's LPR tool to analyze data, collaborate with city staff, and manage public engagement.
Data collection will be done during five different time periods on one weekday and one weekend day.
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