The City of Bozeman’s downtown district possesses a number of parking resources. These include on-street parking, off-street parking lots, a parking garage, private (business) parking lots and alley parking. The City previously did not have a clear picture of the inventory of these resources; rather, only a general estimate of the number of available spaces existed. Additionally, turnover and occupancy rates for parking were unknown. In light of these questions the City of Bozeman’s Parking Commission and the Downtown Bozeman Partnership chose to pursue a parking study, the results of which are presented in this report.

An inventory conducted in July, 2010 found that a total of 5,034 parking stalls were available in the downtown study area. This represented an average of 162 stalls per block, although some blocks contained far more or less than this average. The majority of blocks had between 100 and 200 parking stalls of various types available. Publicly-owned stalls comprised approximately 48 percent of downtown parking inventory, while private stalls (i.e. business parking lots) comprised approximately 52 percent. This totaled to 2,426 public parking stalls and 2,608 private parking stalls in the downtown area

A total of 1,007 (20.1 percent) stalls were recorded as being unrestricted (all on-street). Off-street privately owned stalls were available for patron use only. This private parking was comprised of 1,740 stalls, or approximately 35 percent of downtown parking. The breakdown of public parking restrictions is presented below in Figure 3. A total of 689 private off-street stalls required a permit. Finally, 125 stalls, or 2.5 percent of all available downtown parking was designated as handicapped accessible. GIS mapping was completed to graphically illustrate downtown parking assets and trends.

When occupancy rates were examined, a similar trend was observed between all of the block groups, both on weekdays and weekends. Occupancy steadily increased throughout the morning and reached the peak for the day during the noon hour. This coincided with the lunch hour when downtown restaurants were heavily frequented. Following this midday peak, occupancy rates for most blocks fell throughout the afternoon and evening hours.

Dwell time results indicated that vehicles remained parked for an average of between 38 minutes to 1 hour, based on the location examined. In general, the dwell times observed between on-street and off-street parking did not greatly differ. Overall, dwell time results indicated that most vehicles parked as part of trips which were not necessarily brief in nature.

Results of the turnover rate analysis indicated that off-street parking facilities saw significantly lower turnover; rates for these lots ranged from 0.32 to 0.68. For reference, parking ratios less than 1.0 indicated that the parking being analyzed was not being fully used, while ratios of 1.0 or greater indicated that all stalls were being completely utilized each hour. On-street parking exhibited higher turnover, with rates that ranged from 0.90 to 1.18. The reason for these differences was likely the result of the use of the parking itself. On-street stalls were more likely to be used by motorists who made brief stops at an adjacent business and resulted in multiple vehicles using a given stall per hour. Off-street lots were more likely to be used by longer-term parkers, with a space less likely to be filled immediately after a vehicle left.

Finally, parking demand calculations indicate there is ample parking in the downtown area, based on current inventory. The results of present demand indicated that periphery study area blocks had a surplus of parking, while some core blocks produced a deficit. However, it should be noted that the estimated parking demand for each block and land use may not have occurred simultaneously. Consequently, estimated demand deficits (or surpluses) may not necessarily exist in the patterns that were estimated. Overall however, the demand calculations indicated the existence of a parking surplus which provides headroom for future downtown growth.