Plenty of Parking Spots at Madison Beaches This Weekend

MADISON, CT - Whether it was because Madison has made it substantially more expensive for out of towners to park at town beaches, the fact that it was too damn hot even for beachgoers, or the fact that it simply wasn't July 4th, there was plenty of parking available at both Hammonasset State Beach and town beaches on Saturday.

Patch checked in with Madison First Selectmen Tom Banisch on Saturday (who sent some pictures that accompany this story) to see how the parking situation was going.

Banisch was making a tour of both the town beaches and the state park and said there was plenty of parking for those who dare to test the 95-degree temperatures on Saturday.

Banisch called July 4th - when Hammonasset State Beach filled up early in the morning and the spillover of out of town cars caused a mess at local beaches "an abberation."

Banisch said Saturday: "On July 5 and 6 I went to all of our beaches and there was plenty of parking with the exception of East Wharf which does fill up periodically.

"Last weekend I worked the gate at West Wharf for eight hours and the lot never filled up," Banisch added.

"We haven’t had any overcrowding in any of our beaches since the fourth of July," Banisch said.

Part of that is likely due to major changes officials made to out of town parking rates after Madison residents complained a new parking system recently put into place was not charging out of towners enough and the result was that Madison residents were having trouble finding spots on their own town beaches.

The issue reached a crisis point on this past July 4th when Hammonasset State Beach closed around 11 a.m. due to overflow crowds and out of towners flocked to Madison town beaches looking for a respite from the 90-degree weather.

At a recent special Board of Selectmen meeting on the issue, the Selectmen:
— approved a recommendation from the Beach and Recreation Commission to increase the hourly parking rate at all Town beaches from $3/hr to $10/hr, to be replaced by a daily rate system when the computer software allows it;
— approved a recommendation from the Beach and Recreation Commission to set the hours for hourly parking passes to 8:00 a.m. – 8:00 p.m. at East Wharf and West Wharf; and from 9:30 a.m. – 8:00 p.m. at the Surf Club;
— approved a recommendation from the Beach and Recreation Commission to set a daily minimum pass rate as part of the current Beach Pass System, at $50 per day Monday – Thursday and $75 per day Friday-Sunday and Holidays; to be implemented in accordance with the software requirements of the contractor.