HomeMy WebLinkAbout11/7/2023 Item 6a, Johnson, G.
From:Gail Johnson <
To:E-mail Council Website
Subject:Parking
Attachments:Paul's Parking Ticket 11323.pages
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Dear San Luis Obispo Mayor and Council Members -
I had a business in San Luis Obispo for 35 years. It is never easy to be in business, but the “powers that be” in
San Luis have made it nearly impossible to survive as a small business downtown.
I can’t recall one moment that the streets haven’t been torn up in the last 40 years. Government mandates
(always unfunded) to retrofit for earthquake, flood, water mains, etc. crop up continually, threatening
businesses and property owners. Businesses already must pay to “mitigate” their lack of on-site parking, and
now you are taxing their clients and customers by raising parking fees that are driving people away from
downtown.
Driving around town is like a crazy-car course. The “strategy” for traffic control changes constantly, with
insane roundabouts (obviously designed by people who have no idea HOW and why a roundabout works),
speed bumps that appear and disappear, bike lanes that are confusing at best, and obstacles that require either
a left turn at a blind corner or a u-turn on a two-way street in order to drive in the direction you’d like to go.
You know me, Jan Marx. I am not a hothead or a complainer. But the longer I am away from San Luis Obispo,
the happier I am. I ventured to San Luis from my home in Morro Bay twice last week, and the experience of
driving and parking to my destinations made my trips nearly “not worth the trouble”. And I got a parking
ticket on Friday night (in my boyfriend’s car, so my letter was written in his name). I have attached my letter to
contest the Parking Citation, which describes my experiences in brutal detail. But the bottom line is that I can’t
imagine a reason I will venture to downtown SLO again.
The sign below was posted on NextDoor, so I decided I’d let you-all know how a NATIVE of San Luis
Obispo feels about her home town. It truly hurts my heart to experience what has become canyons of
personality-challenged buildings that rob visitors of the mountain views, echo the sounds of traffic and noise,
stifle breathing, and with frenzied rivers of traffic and impossible parking headaches.
I suppose there is little you can do to reverse the course of “progress”. The LEAST you can do is have
compassion for the folks who have survived so many years with the dysfunction of government, the challenge of
parking and the threat of mandates. Do you think they are expendable? Are they “marginal”? Shame on the
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city that extinguishes its personality and destroys the hopes and dreams of small business owners for the lure
of economic development and bureaucratic appetite.
Gail Johnson
Native of San Luis Obispo (born at Mountain View Hospital)
Mission Grammar & High School, 1958-1970
Former owner of the Kaetzel House (with Victoria Wood)
Johnson Gallery & Framing from 1985-2005
Founder of Art After Dark, 1994 -
.
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