COEUR D'ALENE, Idaho — Heading to downtown Coeur d'Alene to do a little holiday shopping soon? There's good news. The city is opening its brand new parking garage downtown.
This comes after studies showed there were more parked cars downtown than available spaces. By Friday, the city hopes the spaces will be filled. There's roughly 350 new spots in the garage.
Across the street is Knit-Knit one of several nearby businesses. They've been anxious to see the building open. The first two hours of parking here are free.
The charge is one dollar an hour after that.
"To be able to offer that much more parking at such a decent price, I think is significant for our downtown,” Elizabeth Poynor a local business owner said.
The more than $7 million project will fill a big need, city leaders say.
In 2016, a study showed that downtown CDA was lacking 220 parking spaces during peak times.
In a decade, it said more than 100 additional parking spaces would be needed here.
Monthly passes will be sold, which will alleviate the need for some to keep moving their cars in order to prevent getting a ticket.
While it was an inconvenient at times, some say the parking pay off will be big.
Workers were adding some finishing touches Tuesday.
The city is aiming to have the garage open this Friday, just in time for the Coeur d’Alene Resort's lighting ceremony.