City of Omaha working on updating downtown parking meters

OMAHA, Neb. (WOWT) - What you pay for parking in certain spots in downtown Omaha depends on where you park your vehicle.

The city of Omaha is working on updating the parking situation in the downtown area and has plans to buy 5,000 new parking meters. Omaha city officials say downtown parking meters are outdated and need to be replaced.

Parking meters downtown need to catch up with technology. Right now, there are three different looks for parking meters downtown and if you look closely there are two different prices.

Downtown on Farnam between 12th and 13th Street, if you park on the south side of the street and use the older meters it will cost you 75 cents an hour to park. But if you pull up right across the street on the north side to a newer parking meter, it will cost you $1.25 to park.

“We parked on the other side of that building in the shade and we paid $2.50 for two hours,” said Sarah Abel.

Sarah Abel brought her children to the Gene Leahy Mall for some play time, she didn’t know there were two price levels to park downtown.

“I think it’s odd you know I feel like we’re all trying to get into the same area I don’t understand the price difference, I’m happy to be down here and they make it easy paying on the app,” said Abel.

John Hofmeister also brought his children to the mall and got a deal on parking.

“So I didn’t pay to park there was the meter I pulled up to didn’t work, there was no display so we didn’t pay, we would have,” said Hofmeister.

Omaha city officials are thinking about buying 5,000 new meter caps and making all the meters uniform. City parking officials say the new meters will be part of the new parking ecosystem wrapped around the street car system that will run thru downtown streets.

Even though city officials say parking meter technology is outdated you can still pay for parking with cash, card, or through an app. They will look at parking prices across the board to manage supply and demand.

“I guess it kind of makes sense the closer you want to park you’re going to spend a little bit more and if you want to walk it’s going to be a little bit cheaper and you’re going to do a walk, park even further and it’s going to free for a longer walk, I see the logic I see where it makes sense,” said Hofmeister.

Sarah believes she has a better idea about parking prices downtown.

“Free parking obviously,” said Abel.

City officials say there are still working on a contract to purchase the new meter caps, when the process is complete, officials will send out information to the public.

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