Lansdowne Properties has approached High River council to increase parking at the Ranchland Mall, home to Scotiabank and Shopper's Drug Mart.

Mayor Craig Snodgrass says they already own one residential lot behind the mall and are looking at another to pave over.

His concern is there are already a number of parking spaces available, and he doesn't want Second Avenue to go from a residential street to parking lots.

"I honestly do not see the necessity of any additional parking there because you have a 70 stall parking lot in front of Shoppers Drug Mart that's only ever half-full, you've got 13 spots on the street frontage that only have two vehicles in them at any one time and then there's a dozen spots at the backdoor of Ranchland Mall that are also available, so I'm not seeing where the necessity is for, I think they want to put another 40 or 50 parking stalls on these empty lots," he says. 

Snodgrass says businesses always have their reasons for making these requests, but council has to look out for the whole community.

Landsdowne has a prospective tenant in Dollarama which needs a certain number of parking stalls in order to move ahead.

Snodgrass council wants more time to consider the plan.