Children’s Museum to Request Rescinding of Parking Ban

DOWNTOWN WILMINGTON, NC - Officials of The Children’s Museum of Wilmington will ask the Wilmington City Council to amend a new parking regulation that bans non-residential parking on the 200 block of South Second Street from 9 a.m. to 3 a.m. every day of the week. The street runs parallel to two of the three historic buildings that comprise the museum complex.

Larry Sackett, Vice President of the Museum’s Board of Directors, and Executive Director Jim Karl are scheduled to speak at the next City Council meeting on January 7, at 6:30 p.m. in Council Chambers in City Hall.

Karl said that the ban will make it much more difficult for families with small children, particularly those in strollers, to visit the facility. “The lack of parking near the museum has been a long-term issue for visitors,” he said. “Losing a complete block of parking adjacent to the museum could significantly affect the museum’s finances.”

Karl told city council members at the council’s Nov. 6, 2019, meeting that there were plenty of free parking spaces on Second Street adjacent to the museum during the day. He said, “During the daytime, I think there is adequate parking on Second Street, and you are solving a problem that doesn’t exist.”

“We had no notice that this regulation was going to be presented to the City Council,” Sackett commented. “We found out about it almost entirely by accident in a story in the Port City Daily a few days before the council meeting. No one talked to anyone at the museum about the proposed ban before it was voted on.”

"The city is implementing a blanket change where there is no overwhelming issue,” Sackett said. “It is incredibly short-sighted of the city, and particularly the neighborhood, to not realize that we are a good quiet, neighbor.” For more information, please contact Jim Karl at 910-254-3534 or jkarl@playwilmington.org.