Cats and cars. These are the things that seem to be pre-occupying Owen Sound City Council these days. There are parallels.

If you have a cat, or two, or seven, it's because you love their company. You like their purr, the cozy way they make you feel, and you just like to know they are there when you open the door.

Cars are similar. We're used to that familiar sound of an idling car, the way we can adjust that blast of warm air on a cold drive home, and the neat lines of cars that wait dependably for their owners to come out of the house or office.

But just like those who identify themselves as “not cat people”, those who prefer to walk or bike or take the bus or train can find themselves looked upon with suspicion by their car-loving neighbours.

The city of Owen Sound had a big meeting about its transportation master plan and people talked about inter- and intra-city transit, bike lanes and lock-ups and pedestrian safety. Consultants are presumably working away at this as we speak. But what has captured front page attention is straight from an argument over the rules for Monopoly – what does “Free Parking” really mean?

There are city policies that do not allow parking expenses to come out of tax revenue. This makes it a user pay system, however that is distributed. The mayor and many downtown business owners are concerned that, faced with a $1 per hour parking fee, customers will opt for the “free” parking at malls and big box stores.

Of course the parking at malls or Wal-Mart is far from free. It's just that we all pay for it, whether we choose to take a car or even shop there or not.

First we paid for the infrastructure that took development of formerly rural property on the edge of town. And we'll soon pay to take it right to the city's eastern boundary. You can see the spray paint on the edges of the hayfields, and the long stretches of conduit and pipe waiting to be laid. We pay to maintain miles of water mains to service the big box stores, and more miles of sewer to take the runoff from their acres of asphalt to the water treatment plant to remove the salt, rust and car fluids. Occasionally, of course, there is too much rain and it goes directly into the bay and that's a different way we pay.

Of course if you do shop at the mall or a big box store, you pay for your parking again with every single item you buy. All the snow removal, repaving, painting, lighting – the very things that the city pays for in our own downtown – are being added to your bill at the check-out. You are paying for the extra air conditioning in summer caused by the heat absorption of those big parking lots, and replacing shopping carts, curbs and light standards damaged by other drivers.

Don't think for a moment that you as a customer can escape contributing to every bit of the expense side of the ledger of big retailers. You are even paying toward their “charitable” efforts, but that's another column.

Parking spaces outnumber cars at least three to one. Building codes and municipal by-laws demand parking spaces, and retail lots are still being built for some kind of mythical eternal Boxing Day.

What kind of return do taxpayers get for those decisions and investments by our governments? I've been trying all day to find out how much tax is paid on those big private parking lots which represent so much of some retailer's “footprint”. Perhaps we could charge a parking lot surcharge and invest it in creative, affordable public transit or “transit on demand” services that would benefit the whole community.

For now, if you have to drive your car downtown, park it in the lot we own on the west harbour or one of the big retail lots you pay to service, and walk from there.

I'm afraid you've missed the public cat discussion, but there are some interesting meetings ahead – November 25 at 6:30 on downtown parking and December 1 at 7pm on the expansion of WalMart, both at city hall.

If you have bigger concerns than cats or cars, the Grey Bruce Coalition for Peace and Justice is holding a community forum on poverty at the library in Owen Sound on November 25 at 7 p.m. That's where I'll be.