Cookeville Planning Looking At Parking Issue On 8th

The Cookeville Planning Department considering options to limit parking along Eighth Street.

This comes in response to several residents filing complaints about Tennessee Tech students parking in front of their homes. Planning Department Director Jon Ward said residents approached city officials a few months ago.

“You know, the city has parking standards where you can park, distances you have to be from driveways, intersections, fire hydrants, mail boxes, and things like that,” Ward said. “Some days the students aren’t adhering to the requirements of the regular parking requirements. It’s created some concerns for some of the residents.”

Ward said the Planning Commission took this ordinance for study at the June meeting. Ward said he doesn’t know what action the commission will take.

“This is a new thing, this is something that we’ve never looked at before,” Ward said. “It’ll be interesting to see how the Planning Commission feels about it, what’s being proposed, and we’ll just have to wait and see what happens.”

Over 5,500 parking spots are on Tech’s campus. Over 9,000 students were enrolled for the Spring 2020 semester.