Hopefully, your congregation has a parking problem! If you have fewer parking spaces than needed to accommodate the folks that want to worship with you, it means more people can attend, hear the gospel, and respond, if you can solve the problem. Here’s a bit of parking enlargements or solutions that have worked for some of our clients:
- Lease Sunday morning space from nearby businesses;
- Require staff and elders to park far away to free up space for families and handicapped;
- Game plan with other congregations to avoid crowding each other (you tell your attenders to street park to the West and we’ll tell ours to go last);
- Bicycle racks;
- Neighborhood strategy (encourage members to rent or buy housing within distance to consciously make room for visitors). Enjoy the strategy of our client, Immanuel Baptist Church in Chicago, recounted in Paved Paradise: How Parking Explains the World, (link) and “Parking is a Lot,” by Today, Explained.
- Talk to your Alderman or City Council representative about turning off meters on Sundays and creating “Sunday parking allowed” exceptions for otherwise restricted streets in neighborhoods with “resident parking only stickers.” Make sure you let your representative know about how many of your folks (and how many from cooperating churches) live in his or her district and how an accommodation will be appreciated and remembered!
