By Bob Seidenberg

It’s not every day a batch of free parking spaces becomes available in downtown Evanston.

But that was the case Monday when the underground parking garage at Evanston’s Main Public Library, 1703 Orrington Ave., reopened to the public after being closed shortly after the onset of COVID.

The garage, now under library management, offers four hours of parking free. Posted signs stress that the parking is intended for library patrons only, carries a four-hour limit and warns that violators will be ticketed.

While library officials are not monitoring where drivers go once they park, Jenette Sturges, EPL marketing and communications manager, said the library is anticipating that “the location of the garage immediately beneath the library, the four-hour limit, the convenience of pre-existing parking (for example, the dedicated deck atop Whole Foods for Whole Foods shoppers), and the honor system will preserve the spaces for our patrons and visitors will use the garage for its intended purpose of convenient parking for the library.”

The change grew out of revisions to the library’s 2014 memorandum of understanding agreement related to the underground garage, interim Executive Library Director Heather Norborg reported to trustees at their Oct. 18 meeting.

“Previously, the underground garage at the Main Library was a paid, metered lot managed by the city. Library staff provided maintenance, upkeep, repairs and safety monitoring of the garage,” Norborg explained in a memo.

Under changes to the memorandum, library staff will continue to provide maintenance, upkeep, repairs and safety monitoring of the garage, she said.

The agreement also gives the library sole authority to make decisions regarding use of the garage, including designation of parking spaces for special purposes, the opening and closing of the garage and time limits for the public, she said.

Explaining on Oct. 18 how the new arrangement will work, Norborg said, “Parking Services will continue to enforce the time limits for us on a regular schedule of driving through and doing the digital chalking but the library will have control over what the time limit is.”

Library staff supported free parking for several reasons, Norborg said at the Oct. 18 meeting. She said the biggest request officials have fielded during sessions with the public concern at the Main Library. By comparison, parking at the Robert Crown branch is free, she noted.

She told trustees that the four hours fits with Parking Services rotation of the enforcement area.

In addition, she said the library has programs that run two hours or more and the extra time should provide visitors with time to experience an event and also use library services, such as the library’s collection and computers.

Under the agreement, the city will continue to retain all fines incurred by vehicles in the parking garage. Michael Rivera, the city’s interim director of administrative services, acknowledged in an email response Oct. 30 that an agreement had been reached between the city and the library.