As we eagerly await for the City Commission to review an updated plan for the TIA project, as it applies to Broad Street particularly, I want to encourage fellow owners, businesses and residents to voice their opinions and concerns regarding the plan to reduce parking on Broad Street. For those who are not quite up to speed, the current plan for Broad Street involves a reduction of parking spaces from the current 800, down to 650 in order to include green spaces, water features, and a bicycle lane. Originally the plan was to decrease the spaces further, to 450, but after the very negative outcry of those who attended the public meeting last month, the engineers “generously” added some parking back into the plan. I suppose we should be grateful our net loss isn’t quite as bad?
When the TIA project was first discussed and approved years ago, we were told the plan would provide additional parking, not less. For those of us who were aware of the meeting on February 6th, we were shocked to find this was not the case. First of all, communication about the meeting was inadequate and consisted of someone on foot passing out flyers. While I can’t speak for everyone’s experience, I can attest that had I not been inside our building and happened to see someone walk up to the door, I never would have known about the meeting.
Our door was locked and instead of passing the flyer through the mail slot, the footman turned and started to walk away. Thankfully I was able to catch him and share the information with the other businesses on our block, all who were closed as well that day and otherwise wouldn’t have known about the meeting. The lack of communication is not new, as many have already spoken out about their surprise to find work beginning on sidewalks and side streets which cut off access points and disrupted business with no notice or prior information on how to mitigate the work. This leaves us with little faith on what to expect when the Broad Street project does begin. But I digress…
Seeing the block by block plans was a shock. Plain and simple. As one of downtown’s oldest businesses, we at Luigi’s have been operating on the 500 block of Broad Street since 1949, that’s over 75 years and four generations of ownership. We have seen the ebb and flow of downtown and despite pleas for us to move out to Evans, Grovetown, or Aiken, we have remained committed to our history and to our downtown location. The plan as it stands on the 500 block, however, may make it difficult for us to stay. The current project plans to remove the diagonal parking on our business front and replace it with a bicycle lane, half of our center median parking will be removed for added green space, and the diagonal parking against the museum side will be replaced with four parallel spaces.
Currently there are approximately 56 spaces on our end of the block….the plan shows that reduced down to 20. That is a 36 space net loss, give or take a few. On any given night, cars are parked on medians because even with the current 56 spaces, there is insufficient parking. When expressing the concerns with the traffic engineer, the response came across as apathetic. We were informed that parking is underutilized in other areas and that people will need to adjust to parking and walking. If
anyone is familiar with our end of Broad Street, there IS NO other area to park. We are not within walking distance of either of the parking garages downtown and are flanked by the Chamber of Commerce building, which appears to remain in current plans, with no added parking there.
At the recent commission committee meeting, the commissioners charged the project engineers to bring back a plan in 30 days that shows additional parking on Ellis street by making it one way and the addition of timed parking on Broad street. While this will generate revenue for the city, and may help curb some of the few who are using Broad Street for long term parking, I fear this won’t be enough to sustain the needs of our block particularly. I’ve driven Ellis street many times, and it is full of driveways and easements for the businesses located there, hardly enough parking can be generated to replace what has been taken from Broad Street. Those areas should be looked at for ADDITIONAL parking, not to replace was was poorly designed in the first place.
Regarding the bicycle lane, I am still perplexed at how we were chosen for its inclusion when the lane doesn’t run the entire length of Broad. Some blocks have it, some don’t. We not only have a large clientele of elderly who have been dining with us for years, but also do a healthy takeout business. It makes me sad to think that business will be curbed when there are no accommodations for the elderly or for takeout patrons. For a block that has so much energy (finally!) with new restaurants opening and investors with plans for other lots on our block, I fear this parking reduction in lieu of bicycles will work against that growth and development.
I recognize I speak very passionately about this; however I am responsible for protecting the legacy that my father, grandfather and great grandfather worked so hard to build. I also speak for the others on our block who have similar interests and history. I only hope our city officials will help protect our interests instead of supporting a plan that will force us to make some very difficult decisions about our future.
Penelope Ballas-Stewart,
Luigi’s Restaurant
