Some Free Holiday Parking in Downtown State College to Continue During College Football Playoff Weekend

State College will offer an extended grace period for free parking in downtown garages this weekend when Penn State hosts its first College Football Playoff game, a change of course from the original plan for the borough’s annual holiday parking program.

Starting at 6 p.m. Friday and continuing through the weekend, the grace period for parking without charge in the Beaver Avenue, Fraser Street and Pugh Street garages will be three hours, an increase from the current two hour. After three hours, the event rate of $2.25 per hour will be assessed, though participating merchants also offer validation for another three hours of free parking.

To help encourage residents and community folks, as well as guests, to come downtown and shop and enjoy all of our stores.

During the same period, however, the event rate will be in effect at the Beaver Avenue surface lot and McAllister Parking Deck. All meters also will be enforced.

Then from Monday through Jan. 5, all garage, lot and meter parking will be free, as previously scheduled.

State College has offered a two-hour grace period in garages and forgiveness of up to three meter and lot violations as part of the borough’s annual holiday parking program in partnership with the Downtown State College Improvement District.

The plan originally called for the program to be suspended the weekend of Dec. 20-22 if Penn State hosted a College Football Playoff game, with event rates and full meter enforcement in effect.

But in an effort “to help encourage residents and community folks, as well as guests, to come downtown and shop and enjoy all of our stores” during the last holiday shopping weekend before Christmas, the borough worked with the DSCID to instead offer the three-hour grace period at the garages, State College Parking Director Tom Brown said at Monday’s Borough Council meeting.

Aside from the free garage parking, the borough will, as usual during football weekends, lift the “No Parking 2 a.m. to 6 a.m.” and the one- and two-hour restrictions beginning at noon on Friday. Those restrictions will go back into place at 2 a.m. Monday.

All vehicle code violations will be strictly enforced.