HomeMy WebLinkAbout6/7/2022 Item 6a, Christy
Delgado, Adriana
Dave SLO <dchristy100@gmail.com>
Sent:Wednesday,
To:E-mail Council Website
Subject:Parking Deck construction and parking revenue.
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To: Derek Johnson, City Manager’s Office, City of San Luis Obispo
From: Dave Christy, 2582 Flora St San Luis Obispo CA 93401 (805)440-4080
Dear Mr. Johnson,
I want to express my support for a comprehensive plan to build and sustainably fund parking in the downtown core. I
realize that parking fee increases are unpopular, but the on street parking has been reduced, and providing safe and
secure parking in surface lots and parking structures is always more expensive. Delaying plans to build additional
structures will surely increase the cost of doing so. In addition to moving forward on the planned Nipomo Street, I hope
that you have your sights on the project that we will need after that one.
In addition to my support of moving forward deliberately and soon, I would like to make a few observations.
1. There needs to be a plan for downtown workers. We want workers from city and county governments, courts, banks
and food/retail establishments to work downtown. They contribute to the base level of economic activity that is
essential for the downtown to work. I’m not suggesting a subsidy; Cal Poly employees pay to park. But let’s not pretend
that there isn’t an issue, and have a consultative process on solutions.
2. The number of on street spaces that are now dining areas has removed many spaces. So has the designation of many
pedestrian drop off zones, and commercial delivery zones. In my experience the delivery vehicles don’t pull in to those
spaces, and the number of drop off spaces and their location needs to be carefully assessed. There is a police car
parking space on Marsh St near what was a police substation when the building was Copeland’s Sporting Goods. That
was a long time ago. The fact that after all of the work on streets, that space is still marked as such leads me to the
conclusion that there has not been a rigorous, data and policy driven study of downtown parking. As for the dining
spaces, I hope that the revenue that those spaces would generate is fully paid for by the business user with no discount
or subsidy. In my opinion, such spaces should only be permitted to establishments that serve food, and that are open by
noon, and that they be set up and staffed regularly. If there is a public hearing on this issue, I hope that you or your
representative will have data on the number of street parking spaces that are no longer designated as such. Otherwise,
stating that the decks are at higher utilization than pre- pandemic, without recognizing the significant impact of reducing
on street parking sounds disingenuous.
3. Entertainment/events: one of the things that I like about San Luis is the social activity in the downtown
core. Concerts in the park, Fremont Theatre, farmer’s market, movie theatres, and the SLOREP are examples. For
events in the evening, I’d like to see a flat rate for use of the decks and on street after 630pm. Collecting fees at the
decks seems spotty, and I’m not sure that the free hour incentive is as important as it was when you needed to
incentivize deck use (but you probably have the data…). I suppose I’m saying that just like there needs to be deliberate
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thought to downtown workers, there also needs to be deliberate thought to evening diners, movie and theatre goers,
and concert attendees.
Build the deck now! We charge for parking because it has value.
Sincerely,
Dave Christy
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