Nice Place, No Parking

UPDATE: After sending emails to one of the owners, Michael Goldner, and our resident manager, Pam Charlton, we received the following:

"Nancy and John, I appreciate your e-mail and I'm very sorry about the parking problems that you have encountered at the Park. We are going to do several things to help eliminate the problem or make it easier for you to find parking spaces. To begin with you will be allowed to park on the circle and I'm sorry that you were told previously that you could not park in that area. We are eliminating two handicapped parking spaces that are not required.
Finally,the doors to the detached garage spaces in buildings 2123 and 2128 that have not been rented will be left open and available to anyone on a first come basis.They will not be available for rental. Again,I want to apologize to you for the parking issues. Please call or e-mail me if these corrective measures do not help.
Most Sincerely,
Michael Goldner"

Pam's note said basically the same. We'll see if this alleviates the problem. I'm also hoping that any new residents moving in will NOT be placed in any of the buildings on our side of the Office.

Do you see that snow covered circle? It's in front of the clubhouse/office. There are maybe half a dozen spots designated "future residents" parking spaces. BUT there are unmarked spaces for anyone else. Remember this. (Oh, management likes to park on the circle also.)

I took this photograph while standing outside our front door. You can see that there is a whole other building between us and the office. There is approximately ten units in each building.

We noticed that as residents began to move in, parking became a problem. A real problem. A big problem. A problem that caused everyone to have to park in the lots of other buildings, on the circle, and even outside the complex near the fountain! So one day I counted just how many marked spaces there were per building. Eight, there are EIGHT spaces for parking.

When we mentioned this to management we were told, "We know it's a problem, but it's a first come basis". Excuse me? We're paying top dollar for the most-expensive-place-in-Prattville "luxury" apartment for there to be no guaranteed parking?! His next statement was, "You can rent another garage." What?! Oh, it gets even better.

Tonight we come home and find a letter stuck in the door from management that says no one is allowed to park on the circle except future residents and management. Excuse me?! Are they paying rent? What happened to "first come"? Do they circle the complex looking for a place to park?! Of course they're looking for a parking space! There's not enough spots for everyone to park! However, shouldn't those of us paying rent AND management's salary be given first choice for parking?

We walked over and asked where were we expected to park?! It's not like they didn't already know there was a problem. We were told that management "has a right to park out front" and that we should "check out the surrounding buildings" and "park where there's available parking". That would be nice, but I'd like to park near MY building! Not two or more blocks away. We cannot entertain because there are too many nights that there are NO spots. If you come in after everyone has had a chance to get home, you can count on having to park on the circle or even further out.

I've lived in quite a few apartments and The Park by far is the nicest, as far as interior work and layout. Never in my life would I have thought parking would be such a problem, for management to know about it, for the owners to realize it, and for nothing to be done. Except to hand out letters telling us we cannot park on the circle "during business hours" and that if we want to be guaranteed a parking space we can rent another garage - to the tune of another $125 a month! What?!

I'm throwing this out in hopes that someone will have a viable suggestion that I can take to management to fix this growing problem. Each building as basically ten units, with the majority of those being two and three bedrooms. It's a given that you're looking at two cars a unit. So why is there only eight designated parking spaces? One idea I had was to do away with the parallel parking and put in diagonal parking. They just spent money adding etched brickwork and we weren't the only ones that laughed because parking was a much bigger problem than having fancy fake looking brickwork.

Seriously, if you have any ideas or have had a similar problem I would love to hear it. There are four marked spaces in front of each building. There is a courtyard that serves four buildings, so parking is not available in the back when everyone is home. Unless of course, you rent a garage. And we do, but that still leaves John having to walk quite some distance for parking UNLESS he comes home on a shift where the other residents are at work! It's a shame that a complex this nice, this expensive! does nothing more than to say "We know it's a problem" and to send out letters saying that residents cannot park where management and future residents park.

So, do NOT move into The Park. Read carefully, Do.Not.Move.Here! Go to Sweetwater - where you're guaranteed two spaces per two bedroom apartments - or anywhere else, but don't move here! If you do, you'll take up another space and we don't have enough as it is! So come visit me (smile) but don't plan to stay and make it your home. I'll be shocked if we are the only ones upset. There have been too many conversations around the pool. And at the garbage bin, which is another problem we won't tackle here. Hmmm, can you tell I'm a bit upset?