About time! The city let all those new restaurants open and didn't take the lack of parking into consideration.

Disgusting. The city is subsidizing the car storage habits of some at the expense of others? If people want to store their cars in the area, I'm sure the free market is happy to meet this demand at the right price. It cost at least $20,000 for every space of structured parking. That's hundreds of dollars a month. If people want to park, they ought to pay for the cost of their decisions.

How exactly do you reduce traffic by expanding parking availability? More parking equals more cars, period. It's called induced demand, and we've known about it for a long time, yet still go on like it's just a theory. Induced demand is like the climate change of transportation planning. Perhaps if the parking was a little more expensive, folks would carpool or consider taking one of the two bus lines that serve 50th and France.

I like to go to the movie theater and shop at 50th and France from time to time, but it's such a pain in the posterior most of the time because of the limited amount of parking. I don't get what the rest of you are complaining about. Parking for residences in the buildings is taken care of, it's those of us that visit that need the spaces. If Edina wants to offer free parking to people, that's their decision. If they want people to pay to park, then they'll likely kill off a lot of traffic unless merchants can offer reimbursement because of purchases.

I've never had an issue finding a spot in the area, even on the busy weekends. If you live in the burbs and come closer to the city you may actually have to drive the block a couple times or god forbid, park a few blocks away from your destination and WALK!

So let me get this straight.. the city is talking about buying and tearing down a building on a parcel. They will pay $2.65M for the parcel, plus demolition costs, plus likely 200-300 parking spots at $17-20k per spot for the ramp construction costs. This will cost the city upwards of $7.5M to do. Then they will maintain the ramp and patrol it to ensure people don't exceed the 2 hour maximum free parking time. And they won't charge a dime to park there. What is the benefit to the city? They're no longer collecting property taxes on the parcel (they bought it and tore it down). Can they increase the tax rate for surrounding buildings due to increased utility they'll see (more potential customers from free parking)? Perhaps. Will they EVER get back the $7.5M investment? Almost certainly not. Furthermore, why would anyone think that removing buildings to add a parking structure, which adds nothing to the streetscape/economy/character of the area will make this a better place to be? I'm sure the people on here supporting municipally-owned parking lots that don't charge any money would be 100% for Metro Transit making all buses completely free, right? If the business owners of the area are complaining about lack of parking for their patrons, they need to build their own parking lot at a size that will have a justified ROI given the guests they'll get (said ROI can include charging for parking outright or rolling the cost in to their menu prices, either way I don't care). That, or we as a society realize that we subsidize business owners' prosperity with parking because they build restaurants/shops too big to be supported by the communities they serve (those withing walking, biking, or transit distance and the select few who could park on the street).

At 180 spaces, this is $41,666 per space. At 130 spaces, tihs is $57,692 per space. How fiscally irresponsible can a city be? And this will only increase parking by 11% in the 50th/France district.

Excellent points made above. This is a dumb idea. Tearing down a perfectly good building with businesses inside is a mistake. A parking ramp will ruin the character of a prime corner in Edina.

Instead of worrying about parking, how about fixing the 50th and France intersection. Not having dedicated left turn lanes on all four directions is absolutely moronic. Traffic backs up for multiple blocks in each direction as left-turning cars prevent traffic from smoothly flowing through. Driving to or through the area is far more aggravating than trying to find a parking spot.