In letter to newspaper, downtown shop owner disagrees with a parking policy that doesn't exist.

The letter's author appeared in these pages in the spring of 2015, when her shop was blocked without warning by the farmers market.

Mulberry House Antiques and "an encroaching Farmers Market."

Then, she had a solid point about non-communication. Now, she does again, although I'm not sure she realizes it.

Certainly Betty knows that the two-hour parking signs to which she refers were replacements for previous signs that read precisely the same -- and which have not been enforced for six or seven years, since some time during the reign of King England III.

The current "improvements" aren't the cause of the problem, if any.

Rather, it's non-communication once again, and the inability or unwillingness of downtown stakeholders to study and address parking the future of parking.

When dysfunction is the issue, enhanced function is the best solution. It would require lots more communication than presently is occurring, which is the best reason to doubt it will happen.

But a boy can dream.

Timed street parking ill-advised

I have a shop in downtown New Albany. Today I had a customer ask me a very good question: "How does making all the streets two-way help businesses?"

I told her I guess since more people will be stuck in traffic jams on Spring Street they will decide they may as well stop and shop or go to a local restaurant. Oh, wait, they can't park for over two hours, according to new signs, which should be plenty long enough if you can grab some fast food while running through the streets looking in the shop windows.

Apparently the "Powers that be" want to make New Albany look like a big city, but most of our customers are from the big cities who want to enjoy the leisure of eating, shopping, walking and even parking without worrying about tickets or being towed.

This policy also shows a total lack of concern for those people who work in shops and restaurants that have no parking lots (which is most of the small businesses) and already have parking problems made worse by these "improvements."

— Betty Rinker, New Albany