Recently, while digging through the town’s archives, Newcastle Town Clerk Lynn Maloney uncovered two long-forgotten parking ordinances from 1946 and 1989.
According to Newcastle’s attorney, Peter Drum, the effect of the ordinances, if any, remains unclear.
“The multiple parking ordinances make it questionable which of the ordinances are in effect or if any of them are in effect,” Drum said at an Oct. 12 meeting of the Newcastle Board of Selectmen.
Drum advised the town to review town reports from subsequent years to ensure the town hasn’t already repealed one or both of the ordinances. Otherwise, he said, “My advice would probably be to put a new ordinance in place.”
Even if the ordinances remain in effect, enforcement could prove difficult as “there are parking places where they’re explicitly not allowed,” Drum said.
The 1946 ordinance, enacted before the construction of the Rt. 1 bypass, banned parking along sections of both sides of Main Street and on both sides of Glidden Street for “50 feet northeasterly of… Main Street.”
Parking spaces in front of St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church, on-street parking across the street from Sproul’s Furniture and on-street parking in front of the ComeFit Zone all appear to violate the ordinance.
In addition to the ordinances reported last week, a third ordinance from 1998 is also in question. The 1998 ordinance bans “parking on both sides of Route One from the Route 215 overpass north to the Damariscotta/Newcastle town line.”