The city of Lakewood will bolster its parking enforcement following an increase in residential complaints.

A new Enhanced Parking Enforcement project is planned to go into effect next week, along with the city’s first residential parking permit pilot in the Applewood Valley neighborhood, according to a news release.

The enforcement will be carried out by Interstate Parking and focus on issues like parking too close to stop signs and driveways, blocking fire hydrants, parking in bike lanes and other common parking violations seen in the city’s parking study completed in 2023.

According to the survey, 69% of residents said they would support enhanced enforcement in the city, while only 39% said they would support parking permits.

Both the parking permit and the enhanced enforcement are scheduled to begin Monday, but could be pushed back until Aug. 4 depending on the “number of warnings we have been able to issue and how much coverage the parking ambassador has completed on Friday,” Mike Whiteaker, Lakewood transportation engineer, told The Denver Gazette.

The pilot residential parking permit program is currently on a select number of streets in the Applewood Valley neighborhood. Only residents with permits and their visitors, who also must be permitted, are allowed to park on the selected areas of those streets, according to the city.

Decisions on implementing permits in other neighborhoods will be considered once the pilot is over next year.

Residents will have to pay $10 a year per registered vehicle, with two free visitor permits. Extra visitor permits will be $10, according to the ordinance.

Interstate Parking will patrol with marked vehicles for 25 hours a week, handing out tickets that will be processed through the Lakewood Municipal Court.

The city set aside $250,000 in the yearly budget to contract Interstate Parking to help with the enforcement. The ordinance passed 9-1 by the City Council on June 10, 2024.

The expected overall cost is around $200,000, with an additional $20,000 to integrate software into the city’s eCourt software for processing the citations.

There will be 64 different types of parking tickets, ranging from $38 for minor infractions to $225 for the improper use of a handicap placard, according to Whiteaker.

Most of the tickets are at $49, he said.

He added: “The other issue we are addressing is reducing the workload on our police department from parking enforcement so they can focus on higher priority calls from residents.”

More information can be found at Lakewoodtogether.org/parking.