The Willow Glen Resident Parking options brainstormed at WGBPA 'Town Hall' meeting Consolidation and a new paved lot are recommended By Cecily Barnes Customers have been flocking to Lincoln Avenue, especially during lunch hour. But how much longer will these patrons continue to circle for parking before they circle off toward Valley Fair Mall or somewhere else? This exhausting conundrum, which seems as old as Willow Glen's newly booming business district, arose yet again as the primary topic of discussion at a Feb. 4 "Town Hall" meeting sponsored by the Willow Glen Business and Professional Association. Thirty or more merchants gathered around a conference table at Home Savings of America to hash out the oft-discussed issue, which symbolizes vibrancy and success while threatening it at the same time. In the early evening, skepticism loomed large. How many times had the exact same discussion taken place and produced nothing? By the end of the meeting, however, two innovative solutions emerged. One would put a new paved lot behind the Alano Club; another calls on the Planning Department to encourage piecemeal parking consolidation for adjacent property owners. In the past, merchants and WGBPA board members have mulled over the idea of consolidation of a lot for shops on Lincoln Avenue between Minnesota and Willow--similar to what was done in Los Gatos. However property owners, deterred by liability dangers and high construction costs, never agreed. Other past ideas have included parking meters and diagonal parking slots, both of which carry high costs and a host of potential new problems. In contrast, the solutions raised last Wednesday night seemed to have fewer obstacles. By the time the meeting broke up, a new surge of hope had been injected into Willow Glen's parking saga. According to business manager Demetri Rizos, the WGBPA board of directors decided to pick up the matter again, as a top priority for the board. The first suggestion came from former WGBPA president Jerry Caravelli, who proposed that the Alano Club on Minnesota Avenue make good on a pledge made more than five years ago to pave the dirt lot behind its club for additional parking. This would be fair, everyone agreed, since during the large Alcoholics Anonymous meetings, much of the city lot behind the Willow Glen Coffee Roasting Company mysteriously fills up with cars. "It's really not fair to the merchants that at peak hours, the coffee business and others have their parking lot all taken up," Caravelli said. "There's a couple of dirt lots back there that are pretty good size. The guy in charge contacted me [years ago] and said they had plans to redo the parking lot," Caravelli said. "They had promised me they were going to, and I think it's about time they follow up on it." By the end of the meeting it was agreed that Rizos would contact the Alano Club and request it to move forward with this plan. Michelle McGurk, chief of staff to District 6 Councilman Frank Fiscalini, agreed to follow up by reviewing the club's conditional use permit to check if the club could be held legally accountable to develop that lot. The other solution was less concrete but boiled down to one basic premise--if consolidation turns out not to be an option, adjacent property owners and businesses would be encouraged to voluntarily share lots. In the end, customers would have more options for parking since the connection of two lots automatically creates more parking spaces. Marv Bamburg from MBA Architects pushed that idea, which has already been pursued by some Lincoln Avenue property owners on their own. "I think it would be nice for planning to address this issue informally," Bamburg said. Also at the meeting, board member Jeannie Caton agreed to look into finding a new decoration to string across Lincoln Avenue for the next holiday season. All the merchants were insistent that they would help fund the decorations. WGBPA president Dave Machado promised that by the next holiday season, every tree in downtown Willow Glen would glow with light. [ Back to Contents Page | Willow Glen Resident Home Page | Archives ] This article appeared in the Willow Glen Resident, February 10, 1999. ©1999 Metro Publishing, Inc. All rights reserved.