The meter is about to expire on unpermitted and unpaid parking in the Short North and surrounding neighborhoods.

New Columbus parking rules that require residents and businesses to purchase permits and those without a permit to pay by the hour will take effect Jan. 22.

The city's plan goes into effect after years of study, disagreements and public meetings about the parking crunch that has evolved as the Short North became the city’s signature district.

In two weeks, white bags that cover the signs for new parking regulations will be removed, said Robert Ferrin, the city’s assistant director for parking services.

Under the new parking rules, about 6,700 households in the Short North, Italian Village and Victorian Village need to either purchase parking permits or pay the hourly rate in one of five zones. About 1,300 households are ineligible for the permits because they either are vacant or were built in 2009 or after, so they were expected to account for parking as part of their construction.

Ferrin said about 10 percent of eligible households have applied for a permit.

“That’s not where we want it to be. We need folks to stop talking about it and start applying,” he said.

Tools to check for eligibility and to apply for permits are available at ParkColumbus.com. Ferrin said the website has had technological glitches, but those have been fixed.

Resident permits cost $25 a year, with a maximum of two permits per residential household built before 2009. Residents also can buy a $25 guest pass and up to 300 daily passes for $6 each.

Businesses are eligible for up to 10 permits, which start at $100 and get progressively more expensive. The first four business permits are good 24 hours a day only in the zone where the business is located; the last six are good from 6 a.m. to 8 p.m. only in zones farther from High Street.

Visitors to the Short North who park on residential streets will have to use the city’s new Park Columbus smartphone app to pay for parking between 8 a.m. and 10 p.m. They also will have to move their cars every three hours. Between 10 p.m. and 8 a.m., only permit holders will be allowed to park in those zones.

Parking enforcement officers won’t start ticketing vehicles that don’t have permits or overstay the limit right away, but Ferrin said the grace period likely will last only a few weeks.

The city added license plate readers to several parking enforcement vehicles and added a third enforcement shift to help patrol the area. It already has started using the license plate readers in the permit zones around Nationwide Children’s Hospital on the Near East Side.

Ferrin said the goal of the plan isn’t to generate revenue, but that is a likely byproduct. After covering enforcement expenses, that revenue will be reinvested in the area. For example, the city is bankrolling a “mobility fund” that the Short North Alliance administers to help businesses get their employees discounts on "microtransit'' passes for rides on local shuttles, rides with Uber and Lyft and, in some cases, parking garage passes.

Betsy Pandora, executive director of the Short North Alliance, said the organization also plans to pilot a late-night shuttle for Short North employees starting Jan. 22 using $80,000 from the Mid-Ohio Regional Planning Commission.

Workers will be able to park at a Downtown garage for a discounted rate of $3 a day and take the free Cbus shuttle to work. From 10 p.m. to 3 a.m., the shuttle will take them back to their cars in the garage.

“Businesses in the Short North are so unique. The solutions are not just one mode fits all," Pandora said. "We’re really learning that a mix of modes fits most depending on a given worker on a given day."

rrouan@dispatch.com

@RickRouan