Portland is looking to form a new parking permit district, and residents and business owners in some neighborhoods are eager to pay up.

The Portland City Council this week gave its approval for testing a "parking management toolkit," a menu of options -- including parking permits -- that could be deployed in neighborhoods where street parking is stretched thin thanks to the city's growing population and increasing density.

The council gave its nod to testing the toolkit in up to two city neighborhoods volunteered by their neighborhood association or a business district group.

Until now, city code only allowed parking permit districts where neighborhoods were overrun with commuters who were parking on close-in streets and walking or taking transit the rest of the way to avoid high parking costs downtown.

But that didn't address the parking crunch in neighborhoods further from downtown, that have become destinations in their own right -- and which have attracted hundreds of new residents in recent years.

Many of those residents live in newly constructed apartment buildings, some built without parking and others where residents who own cars see no need to pay for reserved parking spots when there's a free alternative on the street.

"We're looking at places that haven't traditionally needed any kid of parking management," said Malisa McCreedy, PBOT's parking division manager. "There's a lot of interest in parking. We felt like for us to get more serious about those discussions, we need permission from council to try some new approaches for these neighborhoods, to meet their needs."

At least eight neighborhood groups asked the city council to approve the new program, among them the groups that include stretches of North Mississippi Avenue, North Williams Street, Northeast Alberta Street, Southeast Hawthorne Boulevard and Southeast Division Street.

The Boise Neighborhood Association, whose borders straddle the Williams and Vancouver corridors, volunteered in a letter to Mayor Ted Wheeler to host the pilot program.

"Parking availability for our residents and businesses has become scarcer with each new building," wrote neighborhood association chairman David de la Rocha, "and we believe that applying some of tools in the kit can help ensure that Boise remains a vibrant place to live, work, and play."

Portland's transportation bureau plans to select the pilot neighborhood, or neighborhoods, and develop a parking management plan with neighborhood representatives by the end of the year.

In whatever districts are formed, an annual permit would cost at least $60. The neighborhood could, however, add a surcharge, with the money collected put into projects intended to reduce parking demand in the neighborhood.

-- Elliot Njus

enjus@oregonian.com

503-294-5034

@enjus