The price of progress? – New Times SLO

Have you dined in a downtown SLO parklet? Maybe you sat on Monterey Street and enjoyed some Italian fare from Giuseppe's Cucina Rustica, whose parklet helped turn Monterey into a one-way street between Chorro and Morro. Or maybe you grabbed a slice at Woodstock's Pizza and ate along Higuera. Or maybe you enjoyed a farm-to-table nosh from Big Sky Caf on the side of Broad. Or maybe you refuse to go to downtown SLO because parking sucks and San Luis is elitist and you remember the good old days. Wah!

The city's temporary parklet program grew out of the COVID-19 pandemic as an attempt to save struggling restaurants during state-mandated lockdown orders. Depending on how you feel about al fresco dining, the parklets were either ingenious or a debacle that made the city's already challenging parking situation even worse.

Can we at least all agree that cocktails-to-go was brilliant? Of course we can't, because we can't agree on anything.

So who wants a permanent parklet program? Not letter writer Rene Scarnegi, who implored the SLO City Council: "This is something that can't be approved! The parklet program served our businesses downtown when they were needed during the pandemic. Nowalmost post-pandemicthey are not needed and we need to get our streets and parking spaces back ... parklets are eyesores!"

Well, bad news, Rene, because parklets are officially here to stay. The council just voted to make the program permanent ... for a price. A steep one at that. How does $8,710 per parking space per year sound?

Woodstock's is going to need to sell a lot of slices if it hopes to keep its three-plus parking space dining parklet open, and co-owner Laura Ambrose couldn't quite get her head around the proposed fees in her letter to the City Council.

"With our current set-up, we will be looking at an annual cost of nearly $28,500 starting next year. A rate of $4.54/square foot for a spot in the street is considerably higher than what we're paying for our fully built-out restaurant building!" she said.

Lucky for her, City Council knocked that fee back to $6,760! Still, a lot. Not only are the new fees exorbitant, but the parklet program now comes with new requirements such as Americans with Disabilities Act compliance and dedicated bicycle parking. She went on to break down the city's fees such as manual street sweeping, which would be $11,700 for Woodstock's three spaces.

"We frequently sweep our outside dining area and will be happy to maintain this without city staff coming in with brooms," she wrote. "We find it hard to believe that sweeping around our parklet alone is costing the city $225/week."

Then Ambrose took umbrage with the city's estimated parking revenue loss of $12,000 for Woodstock's parklet: "This assumes that people will not come downtown and park any longer," she posited. "No, they will just park in other parking spotseither on the street or in one of the city-owned parking structures. So no revenue loss."

She may have a point here. According to the city, there are a little more than 1,000 downtown street parking spaces, and only 50 are currently used by parkletsless than 2 percent of total.

And then there's the charge for tree trimming around parklets$930 a year for Woodstock's: "I realize this is an estimate," Ambrose continued, "but we don't actually have any trees around our parklet."

Sad. Some trees would be nice!

The city has a new parking structure it's trying to finance, which is why about six weeks ago it proposed doubling parking meter fees downtown. According to councilmember Andy Pease, that change is about a year away as the city looks for other options. As far as Big Sky Caf owner Greg Holt is concerned, he's starting to feel he is the other option.

"Perhaps, finding another method of balancing the budget without the individual business covering the entire lost city parking income might be a good thing," Holt wrote.

Perhaps, indeed.

Here's a philosophical thought: If nearly 4,000 oak trees fall in Nipomo's Dana Reserve and everyone is around to hear it, how loud will the protest be? Well, hang on to your hearing aids, because we're about to find out.

Local development firm NKT Commercial wants to build 1,289 single- and multi-family units on Caada Ranch, a 288-acre site off Highway 101, but that means cutting down 76 percent of the parcel's oak forest. According to the draft environmental impact report (EIR): "Hey, no biggie!"

Just kidding! It will be horrible! The woodland "provides important native habitat for plants and wildlife" and "contributes significantly to ... the region's overall biological diversity," supporting eight special-status plants and four special-status nesting birds.

Go away, special-status plants and birds! People need to live here!

Let's estimate 3,000 new people will live in these 1,289 units. Can Nipomo absorb these new humans? The EIR says nope, not really: The project is not "specifically projected or planned for in local and regional county planning documents" and would "induce substantial unplanned population growth in the Nipomo area."

In the immortal words of Joni Mitchell, it looks like we're about to pave paradise and put up a parking lot. Ah, progress!

The Shredder is tone deaf. Yell by emailing shredder@newtimesslo.com.

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The price of progress? - New Times SLO