A city move to replace the meters at Kaimuki's biggest parking lot with an attendant is poised for final approval as a way to ease a constant parking crunch there.

The City Council is scheduled to vote on the change on Dec. 13, which means an attendant parking system could be operating early next year at the parking lot at 12th Avenue and 11th Avenue.

Councilman Rod Tam said he tries to talk his family out of going to restaurants in Kaimuki because of the difficulty finding a place to park there, especially at lunch and dinner.

"It's a crazy place to park," Tam said. "I've seen near-accidents because of people getting frustrated and swearing and cussing at each other."

City engineer Toru Hamayasu said the idea behind the switch is to find a way to encourage the parking spaces to turn over more quickly and to discourage many people from parking in one space all day while the owners feed the meters.

Under the proposal, parkers would pay 75 cents an hour for the first two hours, but the rate would double after that.

"This is the cheapest way for the city to provide more parking," Hamayasu said. "We recognize that there will be a loss of revenue to the city."

Hamayasu said a study completed in 2004 showed "half the parking lot is taken up by long-term parkers."

He said the contractor that successfully bids to run the parking lot will put in $1 million worth of improvements. He said the contractor will repave the lot, smooth over potholes, make it comply with federal disabled-accessibility laws and put in new curbs.

Hamayasu acknowledged that switching to a private operator would result in a drop in city revenue from the lot. But he said going through the normal city construction process would take years longer and cost the same or more over the length of paying off the debt.

Councilwoman Barbara Marshall said she's concerned that the city will lose revenue on the deal, from the current $560,000-plus in annual revenue to a vendor contract worth about $40,000 a year to the city.

"We're talking about giving a vendor a pretty sweet deal," Marshall said, if it continues to bring in similar revenue. But Hamayasu noted that the contractor will put in $1 million worth of improvements.

Kaimuki Neighborhood Board Chairman Mike Abe isn't convinced this plan will help that much. He said the board and many in the community support the concept of a change to an attendant-run lot but he said he'd like to see the detailed traffic plan before endorsing it.

Although numerous nearby businesses have supported it, Abe said he's not sure the new plan will do enough to relieve the problem at lunch and dinner and will create a parking shortage for people who work in the area. "Businesses are afraid of the impact," he said.

Councilman Charles Djou, who represents the area, said the solution isn't perfect but looks to improve a bad situation without spending a lot more money. "It's what we need for now," he said.

He thinks a long-term solution would involve building a parking garage on the neighboring Kaimuki park basketball courts and moving the courts to the rooftop of such a garage.

Reach Robbie Dingeman at rdingeman@honoluluadvertiser.com.