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# A brake with tradition is at issue
- URL: https://www.smdp.com/a-brake-with-tradition-is-at-issue/
- Published: 2006-03-18T16:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-23T17:22:18.000Z
- Author: Guest Author
- Tags: Business, Downtown, #archive-import

This past week, Q-line asked: “Do you support the building of new parking garages in Santa Monica? Why or why not?”

Here are your responses: ✆ “Of course I support more parking garages in Santa Monica. We need them constantly for shoppers and visitors. If Kevin McKeown wants to ride his bicycle around town that’s fine, but there are people who come in from out of town with rental cars and all types of business people who need parking, and the Promenade will never get less busy. So it’s about time we make the move and have some vision about the parking situation in Santa Monica.” ✆ “I am against increasing parking garages further into the city of Santa Monica because more cars in downtown Santa Monica, more environmental impact in Santa Monica, and more greenhouse effect, in a larger effect. I also think Santa Monica should really start thinking about developing for a world with less oil available. I mean, close your eyes and think about what’s going to happen if there is not enough oil anymore to drive all those cars, and do we want to deal with that at the time it’s happening, because it may start happening soon.” ✆ “The city shouldn’t have to pay to build all these parking buildings when it’s not the city who is bringing in all the traffic. Every time these developers, they get in, come in, and they tear down something little to build something big and that brings in more people. So, if anyone should be paying to build more parking spaces the developers should. Make them put in parking in their own projects or make them pay for the parking buildings, the city shouldn’t have to pay for it.” ✆ “I think leave it the way it is. However, as a disabled member of this community, I think it’s high time for you to fix the streets and sidewalks because they’re not pedestrian friendly or wheelchair friendly.” ✆ ”Reno, Nevada, has the reputation of being the biggest little city in the world. Apparently, the entity that stamped that label on Reno, had never visited the city of Santa Monica. If Reno, Nevada, had the same amount of vehicular traffic that Santa Monica has on a daily basis it would truly be the biggest little city in the world. There is not an intersection anywhere in Santa Monica, on a daily basis that does not have vehicles jockeying for crossing rights. And how can there be any other way? Nearly every westbound and major roadway from all points east empties onto Ocean Avenue in Santa Monica. It does not matter if the city adds 700 new parking spaces, or seven million. If the city built seven million, then motorists would come to Santa Monica to see seven million parking spaces. It does not take much to excite some people. Santa Monica has two major drawing cards, and by the most part are free. Those two things are the Pacific Ocean and the most beautiful sunsets known to mankind. Trust me folks that’s it.” ✆ “The need for added downtown parking spaces and parking structures has been reaffirmed in the face of proposals voted by the Santa Monica Big Blue Bus company to reduce evening and weekend service on some lines, and to double the bus fares by eliminating free transfers for those who need to connect from bus to bus to get downtown. Since public transportation will become impractical and useless for many who now use public transportation to get downtown those people who might wish to visit the Promenade at night and on weekends will have to rely upon their cars or at least rely upon friends or relatives to drive them downtown. Many more parking spaces therefor are imperative. However, councilman McKeown whose no growth policies downtown have contributed to the imminent failing of the movie complexes on the promenade as wonderful theaters are built outside of Santa Monica, might actually see his position justified in the long run as the theater complexes on the promenade close without replacements, meaning that fewer people will need to reach the promenade by public transportation, or by car, and the proposals by the Big Blue Bus company and Kevin McKeown’s adamant position about parking structures might signal that the theaters are gone without replacements.” ✆ “What? More buildings downtown? It’s like driving through canyons as it is. Building five-story parking structures just gives the developers a foot in the door to build higher. More businesses and housing downtown mean more of what our leaders love most: taxes to spend on their social programs. How about less business, less housing, less traffic, less bums, less City Hall bureaucracy? We want our beach town back.” ✆ “I strongly support the building of the new parking garages in Santa Monica, the original plan of 1712 spaces. In addition, I think they should make those buildings two more stories higher and put low income housing on top of them and do this whenever they have a public works project for a new library, police station, fire department parking structure, whatever they got the funds to do the building that does not cost them that much more to but two stories on top and give people a place to live.” ✆ “Spending a large amount of public money on parking cars is becoming less and less wise given that the ability to use cars is becoming more and more compromised by the price of fuel and the congestion. Let’s focus on getting people into downtown without having to use their automobile. Let’s get them onto smaller vehicles, let’s get them onto mass transit that works for everyone especially the employees who are trying to make a living downtown. It’s to expensive to drive from places where they can afford to live. So less parking and better ways to get people into downtown that don’t require cars.” ✆ “Well, the 715 spaces seem warranted. It’s the 1,000 extra spaces that, a developers scheme, to have the city provide parking for a half million square feet of unapproved new commercial development in downtown. That’s in addition to the civic center and the Santa Monica Place. Just how much more congestion do we want our downtown to be in Santa Monica?”

*Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on March 18, 2006.* [Read the original PDF.](https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/smdp%5Fbackissues/031806.pdf?ref=smdp.com)