Lack of Parking Inhibits Visitors

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Editor,

 

I will be out of town on March 26 so I won’t be able to attend the village entrance meeting. I just wanted to express my support for the new village entrance plan, especially as it pertains to much needed parking. I have always thought that festival attendance was negatively impacted by the lack of parking. Even though the community has been polled about their concerns, we haven’t taken a poll of the neighboring communities and what keeps them from shopping and attending our events here in Laguna Beach. I have spoken with many people over the years, and even though it is only anecdotal, the results of my poll say that parking is their number one concern when coming into our lovely city, especially in the summer.

I would love a new parking structure in the canyon. This is where we need it most. It should be aesthetically pleasing and function efficiently, getting cars off the street quickly to ease congestion. The worst thing is when people are frustrated and angry before they even get inside the festival. Any effort we make toward accommodating our guests is welcome. Lets make it a pleasant and easy experience to come and spend money here in our beautiful, artistic city.

I understand the people who wish to keep rampant development at bay, but I don’t agree with the head-in-the-sand mentality about parking.

 

Patti Jo Kiraly, Aliso Viejo

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2 COMMENTS

  1. In a car saturated culture it is difficult for folks to grasp that adding more automobile infrastructure simply attracts more cars and increases congestion rather than decrease it. During Community Workshop #3 on 20 March RBF Consulting showed the LB Planning Commission and audience that downtown parking is already saturated at 100% utilization. In a Q&A they showed us just to maintain our 100% utilization we must double available parking every 18 years (a 4% growth rate). The consultants agreed that adopting a multi-modal transportation system was preferred to building more parking structures in Laguna due to cost, space and growth constraints. This is the same view Laguna advocates for alternate mobility have maintained all along since writing the Vision 2030 Plan in 2001. It remains to be seen if Laguna decision makers follow consultant’s advice.

  2. There is plenty of parking in town it is just not used for optimal use. If employees and owners of companies in town were shuttled it there would be plenty of parking. This would encourage visitors to stop and enjoy our little piece of Heaven. In are car saturated culture the car is king. The reality is when communities try these using public transportation a large percentage of the visiting community will not use that transportation. But we have a captive audience that comes to town every day and is here for long hours. The employees can easily be tranported leaving large amount of parking open. If we tried that for one month everyone would be surprised about how many of the cars in town are people working.

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