By Gene Felder
The City Council squanders money paying consultants money usually to tell us the obvious or something that doesn’t fit Laguna Beach in anyway. A parking study was referenced in the recent parking subcommittee meeting where the consultant’s data determined that downtown Laguna Beach has adequate parking.
The City Council majority of Peter Blake, Sue Kempf and Bob Whalen used this to justify the recently revised downtown specific plan not requiring expanding businesses to provide more parking. This fits with recent approvals Coast Inn and White House Restaurant, more restaurant tables, more intensification, but they basically provide no parking for their customers.
The City has laws that when a business cannot physically provide additional parking spaces that they pay Parking-In-Lieu fees, but over the last five years no Parking-In-Lieu fees were collected.
The IBI Group Parking Report said that “The current total overall supply is 3,365 spaces throughout the DSP [Downtown Specific Plan] area”; their Table 1 Parking Inventory showed this to be 1,674 public and 1,691 private parking spaces.
The IBI Group parking demand study resulted in an analysis that normally in the summer weekdays there are at least 775 empty parking spaces downtown (1,674 public spaces 46-90% occupied and 1,691 private space 35-64% occupied).
That normally in the summer weekends there are at least 658 empty parking spaces downtown (1,674 public spaces 62-97% occupied and 1,691 private space 43-64% occupied).
That normally in the non-summer weekdays there are 1,380 empty parking spaces downtown (1,674 public spaces 31-62% occupied and 1,691 private space 21-56% occupied).
That normally in the non-summer weekends there are at least 1,482 empty parking spaces downtown (1,674 public spaces 44-67% occupied and 1,691 private space 34-45% occupied).
Quoting from the study “Based on these observed occupancies and the current public and private parking supply, which was further analyzed according to the area’s land uses, the study resulted in three key findings.”
“Key Finding #1: The City can benefit from reducing the minimum required parking requirements for non-residential uses in the DSP area. The overall actual built supply of parking spaces exceeds overall actual demand.”
“Key Finding #2: Private parking spaces are underutilized. Parking demand in the Downtown Specific Plan area is higher in public parking spaces than in private parking spaces during both summer and non-summer months.”
“Key Finding #3: The Downtown Specific Plan area attracts more visitors during the summer season.”
Is this a good use of Laguna residents’ taxes? Can it possibly be true? Apparently, true enough that the City Council majority has followed this consultant’s advice to the extent of eliminating public parking spaces downtown, relieving expanding businesses the requirement of providing additional parking, and waiving the collection of parking-in-lieu fees.
Gene is president of the Top of the World Neighborhood Association and treasurer of Laguna Residents First PAC.
