Third draft of parking plan goes to the council July 17
By Nathan R. Huff
Aspen parking consultant Tim Ware will stay for another week to try to mediate a number of issues and concerns surrounding the downtown parking plan.
The town council voted on June 19 to extend Ware's contract, paying him $2,000 for two more days of meetings with the public, the downtown community parking task force and the owners of the Los Gatos Cinema.
The town hopes the extra meeting will close the gaps between competing downtown interests--employees, residents and, most recently, church parishioners. Disagreements exist over the price of permits for residents, employees and downtown visitors, as well as the extent and hours of public parking in neighborhood areas.
"The meetings are really a function of how completely we can get the thing defined to everyone's satisfaction," outgoing town manager Dave Knapp said. The town is working to have a plan in place by the Christmas holiday season. It hired Ware in April to work with the town and downtown interests, and create a parking management plan to alleviate the annual space crunch.
The plan, in a nutshell, features metering stations at all downtown lots, as well as the main streets. The proposed pay-and-display metering system dispenses tickets for a specified length of parking time. As of the second draft of the plan, downtown parking would cost $1 an hour from 10 a.m. to midnight.
Other key aspects of the plan include designated parking areas for employees with permits, residential zones with meters and permits for residents, and the possibility of a downtown shuttle system. For more specifics, copies of the plan can be viewed at the town clerk's office, the library and the Town of Los Gatos Chamber of Commerce office at the Bank of America on N. Santa Cruz Avenue.
According to recently hired parking coordinator Robin Tole, aside from general opposition to paid parking and disagreements over permit prices, the most "noise" is coming from churches and the downtown theater. Parishioners of both St. Mary's and Los Gatos United Methodist Church have expressed opposition to paying for parking while attending services. James Zuur, an owner of Los Gatos Cinema, said paid parking would likely force the theater out of business.
Ware will meet twice with the downtown task force, a grass-roots group of neighbors and downtown business owners, once with the owners of Los Gatos Cinema, and once with the general public. A third draft will then be prepared and submitted to the Town Council on July 17.
Tole emphasized that the plan sent to council would not necessarily be the plan that would be adopted. "This is the draft that will go before council," Tole said, "but this does not mean if we adopt it and go forward and something happens, we can't change it."
Ware's contract extension also expands the town's maximum expenditure from $12,000--the original contract amount--to $25,000, though Ware is only scheduled to be compensated $2,000 plus expenses. Knapp said the increase was strictly for logistical purposes. "That gives us the capacity to spend more if we need to without going back to council," Knapp said. "We certainly don't intend to spend $25,000."
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Los Gatos, California Since 1881
