HOW MANY WORDS DOES IT TAKE TO SAY “PAID PARKING”?
Atkins:
In terms of the required parking … Can I ask you, will there be any
thought to making some of those spaces available to the public? Someone
might want to park there and go over to the library…. It's great that
you have 22 extra spaces. I think in urban communities, I know, me and
Mr. Peters may disagree on this. But I find when you don't allow enough
parking, it does cause problems. I drove down Marlborough today.
Granted, people are voting at the church, but there was not a place on
Marlborough to park. Is that something that you would look at, in terms
of shared parking?
Mitch Berner: Yes, to both your
questions. Those are intended to operate as public spaces. Secondly,
there is an intent to make those available to the other resale uses
around the, for instance, the restaurant that may not have enough curb
side parking. They may choose to provide valet parking service. Those
extra spots would be made available to them and everybody else to
relieve issues in the community elsewhere, where there is parking
shortage. …
Atkins: There would have to be some agreement worked out to allow for that, correct?
Mitch Berner:
Correct. The examples I'll use, the lowest floor of the parking is
intended for residents only. That would be secured for the use of the
residents only. The level above, which is the first floor as you enter –
the example I use is that the Hillcrest Cinema – they operate off of a
receipt system. If you're going into that shopping center, everybody
gets a parking sticker. If you do business in that center, you get
validated, no cost for the time you're there. There's time limits, much
like Horton Plaza has. The intent is to extend that service to the
adjacent restaurants and other retailers to say, after hours, when it is
open to the public, everybody can use it, but we want to first make a
gesture to the other retail uses that are parking short. They, too, can
participate in the validation system, so that their patrons can choose
to park in this building or not.
Atkins: So that would be paid parking?
Mitch Berner:
Not necessarily. The example I use of the validation system, this has
not yet been determined with whom those agreements will be struck. We
may choose to have a reciprocal parking agreement where they may
participate in that validation system, they don't own or control the
building, but we've entered into an agreement that would allow them
during the business hours and their patrons to use this building without
necessarily a charge. Will there be a charge? I can’t say.
OR YOU WON’T SAY! HE COULD GO ON AND ON AND ON AND ON AND…. BUT IT'S STILL PAID PARKING
And
now our favorite City Traffic Engineer again avoids answering a direct
question, which will come back to haunt the City Attorney very shortly.
HOW TO AVOID ANSWERING A DIRECT QUESTION
Atkins:
That's my next question. To designate that delivery trucks, that the
route – I want it know if you can do this and I’m asking the attorney to
monitor and help me here, I want to know if you can designate that
delivery trucks, the route that they must take should be I-15 to Adams
Avenue, and no other route, including Aldine Drive. And my rational for
this, if delivery trucks are delivering to Adams and right at your
project, they can take I-15. If they're delivering stuff off of El Cajon
Boulevard, they can -- I am concerned about heavy trucks coming up
Aldine Drive, and people need the bus route. It is a connecter from
Talmadge to Kensington. There are many residents who would not like that
closed. I am concerned about heavy vehicles on Aldine Drive, and if
you can put in the leases that the delivery trucks use I-15 and Adams
Avenue and specify out that Aldine Drive not be used because that is a
residential area.
Jansen: We would agree with that. We'd
work with traffic to make that happen with some kind of signage and then
work with the leases and tenants and when we start our negotiations we
will make that condition.
Deputy City Attorney: I would need to know if there would be any impact to the traffic analysis that was utilized for the MND
such that this change would warrant additional traffic analysis and
perhaps recirculation of the MND, so if you could address that and also
any other concerns that you might have.
Development Services, Senior Traffic Engineer Labib Qasem:
I believe that restricting deliveries to come from I-15 should be easy
to control. I think we could add a condition to that. But in addition
to that, I would like to also suggest that during construction, similar
activities for, during construction, heavy trucks coming through, not
just delivery after the stores are open.
Atkins: I haven't gotten to that. A lot of that was in the MND in terms of people who are concerned.
YET NO MENTION OF DELIVERY ROUTES OR CONSTRUCTION TRAFFIC ANALYSIS AND MITIGATION WAS IN THE MND!
This is just the sort of thing that the Grand Jury was talking about in its Case Study on Kensington Terrace.
And
on the left, still available from the Planning Commission hearing, are
the presentations made by various residents. You can view the
PowerPoint slides that accompanied the presentations made by
neighborhood residents during the November 15th meeting.
We
explain what's wrong with the Environmental Study, especially the
traffic study, we review the actual character of our commercial
district, not just a long, lingering look at the Starbuck's building,
and we address all of the other impacts that should have been addressed
had the job been done properly. It's all part of the public record now.
But here's one of our favorite discrepancies in the Environmental Study prepared by the City:
