Board Votes to Make Woodward Avenue Service-Drive Parking Restrictions Permanent

The Multimodal Transportation Board voted March 6, 2025, to recommend permanently enacting a package of evening and weekend parking restrictions on Woodward Avenue service drives after a trial run staff reported reduced crowding and fewer enforcement calls. The board’s motion specified multiple service-drive segments and time windows and asked staff to forward the recommendation to the City Commission for formal enactment.

Captain Kearney and police staff reviewed the trial, which set time-limited parking (generally 15-minute) from 7 p.m. to 6 a.m. Friday through Sunday on most service-drive segments and adjusted limits in places that support business patronage (for example, 2-hour spaces near restaurants were retained). Staff said the trial sought to address persistent cruising, loud gatherings, trash and impromptu street-side car shows that previously stretched limited weekend enforcement resources.

Police and parking enforcement reported the trial succeeded primarily by creating awareness: officers and parking staff walked the service drives to educate motorists, wrote relatively few tickets (staff estimated about 20 or fewer across the season), and said the presence of restrictions and brief enforcement reduced repeat gatherings. Staff noted they had also negotiated agreements with some private parking-lot owners to enable officers to clear private lots when crowds used them outside business hours.

The board’s motion, carried March 6, 2025, directed staff to forward a recommendation to the City Commission to make the temporary traffic-control order permanent for the listed segments and times; the motion included specific block ranges and a retained 30-minute segment already in place between Brown and Hazel. Board members praised the cross-department implementation — planning, police and parking enforcement — and several called it a pragmatic solution to a recurring public-safety and quality-of-life problem.

The action will go to the City Commission for final approval; staff said dream-cruise weekends and other sanctioned events are handled separately (enforcement and restrictions are lifted or adjusted for those events by prior agreement).