Borough officials could soon have another round of talks on one of Lansdale’s most popular topic: parking.
SEPTA has announced plans to start charging at garages and parking lots across the region, including the 600-plus-space garage behind the Lansdale train station.
“These fees will help offset parking lot maintenance costs as we continue to do our part to generate revenue in the midst of a funding crisis,” said SEPTA CEO and General Manager Leslie Richards in a SEPTA statement.
Lansdale's parking garage opened in 2017 after roughly a year and a half of construction, and at the time SEPTA officials said the 680 spaces in the garage and roughly 120 more surrounding it were meant to make SEPTA access easier for riders worried about finding spaces. The $42 million garage was closed by SEPTA in March 2020 with the onset of the pandemic, reopened in early 2021 amid talks on parking during snow emergencies in town, and was referenced in an update to a borough parking study completed in late 2023.
In a statement on Aug. 12, SEPTA announced that the regional transit agency was planning to reinstate parking fees starting Sept. 23, including in SEPTA parking garages in Lansdale, Norristown and at the Frankford Transportation Center, with new parking fees of $4 per day in those garages, and fees of $2 per day at surface lots.
A SEPTA train pulls into the Pennbrook station on the border of Upper Gwynedd and Lansdale on Tuesday, June 14 2022.The SEPTA announcement included details of how the transit agency is phasing out slot boxes for payments, mobile payment options, and details for when the parking fees would begin at the lots all along the agency's rail lines. Fees are slated to restart on Sept. 25 for the Lansdale garage and surrounding lots and for the parking lots at North Wales Station, fees starting on Sept. 27 at the Fort Washington and Ambler stations, and starting dates in October for the rest of the stations on that line, including at Pennbrook station in Lansdale on Oct. 25.
“We understand how increasing fees could impact riders, but we hope they will still see public transit as an overall value – saving time and money compared to driving a vehicle,” Richards said.
Lansdale's borough council and various committees did not discuss parking at their Aug. 7 meetings, and the borough parking authority's last meeting in July listed parking passes for the garage as a discussion item. Other items on the parking authority's agenda included updates on the borough freight station rehabilitation project, signs for the newly paved parking lot around the freight station and possible bike facilities there, and possibilities for bike parking and car sharing services in town; the parking authority also currently has one vacancy among its five seats.
Lansdale's parking authority next meets at 6:30 p.m. on Sept. 9, and the various council committees next meet starting at 6:30 p.m. on Sept. 4, all at the borough municipal building, 1 Vine Street. For more information visit www.Lansdale.org.
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