Quote:
Originally Posted by pesto
Back to parking again.
SM and Pasadena are the most successful DT revializations. They each provide enormouos amounts of parking, as do Glendale and others. Venice is tiny in comparison. Conversely, cities as diverse as Beverly Hills and San Jose found that DT business dropped dramatically when they stopped subsidizing parking.
Per Huizar's office, parking is the biggest issue DT, at the top of the list for residents, landlords, retailers and potential investors and builders. That is, everyone who is actually voting with their time and money. The art walk crowd is hardly the type of person that retailers and restaurants want DT. They are looking for people with money, not a frat party for aging slackers.
I agree that there is available parking downtown. But part of marketing an area for shoppers is to make it easy. One way of doing this is to make sure there is plenty of safe, automated parking at consistent, reasonable rates (specifically in the plans for SM and Pasadena and a no-brainer for any shopping center). This boils down again to do we want DT to be a real center for the city with retail, theaters, bars, clubs, restaurants, etc. (ala Union Sq.) or just to serve local needs (Famima, Walgreens, donuts). People really are not going to take the subway to do their shopping or for dressier occasions.
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We're not saying "no parking" is required. Some parking is needed. What we're saying, is there IS SUFFICIENT PARKING readily available. Drive on Spring, Main and Broadway and count the amount of parking garages (hint: it's greater than the # of garages in Pasadena, Santa Monica or Venice combined).
What we're saying is that let's work on revitalizing what we have existing and stop giving away even more space to the private automobile. Cities have been destroyed with the amount of buildings lost to parking lots. It's quite sad.
And again, it's NOT parking that brings people, it's the attractions.
Anybody want to party in Santa Clarita or the Valley this coming Friday night? I heard there's THOUSANDS and THOUSANDS of parking spaces and NO TRAFFIC. That's what everybody wants, right? Hence why Kansas City, Austin, Santa Fe, Charleston, etc.. are the bastions of economic activity and not New York, Chicago, Paris, London, Tokyo, LA, etc..where there is constant traffic and "no parking". Right?
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