Don’t Play Parking Russian Roulette in the French Quarter!
Photo by Bryan Dorrough
For the most part, parking on the streets of the French Quarter is a very bad proposition for visitors. Stringent parking control measures are in effect and meter limits are strictly enforced by dour and determined meter maids. Tow trucks are always on the streets, even at night – especially at night – and many a visitor’s trip has been ruined by an expensive detour to the City Pound to retrieve a car illegally left in a no-parking zone, too close to a corner or in a protected zone. Here are a few tips to help you skip the fuss and find trouble-free parking in the French Quarter.
Photo: Lonesome Yellow Bike by Theodore Lee
Navigate Parking Like the Locals
In the back of the Quarter, a residential parking program gives local registered parkers an advantage and a pass, but even registered parkers have to play a tricky game of hopscotch parking to stay ahead of street cleaning and time limits. Many residents arrange to park their vehicles in private lots or parking buildings nearby, at significant cost, we might add. Savvy Quarterites walk, bike, scoot and generally take advantage of the historic district’s appealing scale.
Parking at Your Hotel
Visitors with reservations at French Quarter hotels can park their vehicles with the hotel but should be aware that it is an extra charge and can be as much as $30 to $45 a day. Don’t even think of bringing an oversized vehicle onto the streets of the Quarter without some good and defensible reason, prior permissions and permits from the Police Department. Anything bigger than an SUV is likely to get jammed at the corners and stymied on the narrow streets that were originally laid out for horse-drawn vehicles.
New Orleans, LA (French Quarter) by Jason Paris
Parking Lots and Garages in the French Quarter
But don’t despair, there is ample and convenient parking available all along the riverfront side of the French Quarter. Download a pdf of French Quarter Riverside Parking Lots.
- Beginning at the Canal Street upriver border of the district near the Aquarium, Canal Place and Custom House there is multi-story covered parking in the Canal Place Garage. The entrance is at the end of Iberville and the River.
- Moving downriver along North Peters there are large lighted lots at Iberville and North Peters, Conti and North Peters, and Toulouse and Decatur, all convenient to the Jax and Millhouse developments and Jackson Square. These lots extend to the levee wall and streetcar tracks running along the riverfront and are much bigger than they appear from the street.
- At St. Peter and Decatur is the entrance to the French Market parking lot that is between the Market and the Moonwalk and extends all the way to Barracks Street and the Old U.S. Mint.
- Just at the downriver border of the Quarter is another French Market lot at the corner of Decatur and Elysian Fields.
Here’s some good advice: park anywhere in these riverfront lots and enjoy the French Quarter without risking the nasty loss that accompanies the street-side game of parking roulette.
To reserve French Quarter parking in advance, click here.
