By Kathleen Pierce, kpierce@lowellsun.com
LOWELL -- Beep, beep, beep.
Katie Copley stares blankly into the parking kiosk on Middle Street.
"I'm trying to figure out how to put my money in," said the 25-year-old with credit card in hand.
She hits a button, scrunches up her nose and waits. The beeps continue.
"This would really stink if I had an appointment. I was here for 10 minutes," said the Lowell resident, who fumbled twice before successfully paying for two hours of on-street parking.
In March the city started replacing coin-operated parking meters in the "core downtown" with new pay stations. It may be easier on meter maids, whose hand-held computers alert them when a ticket should be issued, but drivers are hitting some rough patches.
First you have to locate a terminal, remember your space number and pay with coins or a credit card. Although directions are clearly marked, the system takes some practice.
"It's too complicated. There's a red button, green, and yellow. It doesn't tell you what the colors mean," said Chloe Judge, a clerk at the Market Street Market and barista at Brew'd Awakening Coffeehaus on Market Street, where digital kiosks were installed last week.
Several times in the last few days, car owners have asked her for assistance. "They are mostly elderly, but they are right -- it is confusing," she said.
Like the city's parking garages that went automatic a few years back, there is a slight learning curve.
"We had ambassadors there for the first two to three weeks helping people out. Once they are shown the technology, people like them," said Lowell Parking Director Chuck Carney.
And the city likes the extra money they bring. Carney said the 34 machines, which cost $8,000 each, will pay for themselves within the first year.
"It will be about a 20 to 30 percent revenue increase. The old meters seemed to break a lot. It's a problem when they weren't working," he said.
The system, manufactured by New Jersey-based Metric Parking, is supposed to be error-free, but the switch has not been entirely seamless. One new kiosk on Market Street beeped all weekend from Friday night to Monday morning.
"Coming out of the gate we had some technical problems, mostly with AT&T. But last month, we had no problems in the system," said Carney.
Standing in front of the Village Smokehouse with a $5 bill in hand, Kim Davis, a therapist from Tewksbury, had a problem.
While waiting in line to pay for her space, she realized she had to go back to her car to fish for coins. "It doesn't take dollar bills? I don't like that."
The machines do accept credit cards, but some people, like Brew'd Awakening owner Andy Jacobson, are leery of racking up a measly 50 cents on credit. On the plus side, Jacobson appreciates the flexibility a kiosk-linked system provides.
"You can be on any street downtown and you can re-up your time," he said.
There is another plus for merchants like Robert Nason of Market Street Market.
"Fewer people come in and ask for quarters," he said.
This story appeared in the Lowell Sun on Saturday, May 16, 2009