[OldNorth] Text of Position Presented to DDBA

[Bruce Winterhalder]

John  and  Others:
         Here is the full text of a position statement I prepared,  in 
response to the invitation from Ms. Cole-Rowe to present the neighborhood 
perspective before the parking committee of the Davis Downtown Business 
Association.  The resolution I posted previously grew out of this meeting.
         Unfortunately, this copy (several format transitions through 
'paste-and-copy') does not have the small table (see "*" toward the bottom) 
of OND parking statistics, summarized from the data gathered by Dennis.
                 Bruce

1/17/04
Ms. Cole-Rowe and members of the DDBA:

         I am Bruce Winterhalder, resident of Old North and 
board-member-at-large of the Old North Davis Neighborhood Association 
(ONDNA; <http://www.oldnorthdavis.com/)>http://www.oldnorthdavis.com/).  On 
behalf of the association, I want to thank-you for the invitation to 
discuss parking.  I will try to share the perspective of ONDNA members, 
with the caveat that this is my personal summary and not official ONDNA 
positions.

         You may know parking problems have been a subject of ONDNA 
discussion and action for over a year now.  In common with the downtown, we 
have a parking problem.  In response, we have gathered and presented to the 
City of Davis petitions that constitute the first step in a review that 
would lead to a restrictive parking district.

         Two facts are essential to an understanding of parking in OND:
         (1)     Old North is made up of very small lots (typically, 
approx. 5000 sq. ft), few of which have off-street parking; and,
         (2)     We are the _only_ neighborhood adjacent to the 
downtown/university core that has not yet implemented a restrictive parking 
district (Loflund map).

         The first means that old north residents must depend on street 
parking.  Unfortunately, the second means that we cannot depend on street 
parking.  Between 8-9AM and around 6PM it often is impossible to locate a 
parking place in our neighborhood.  It is full up and sometimes, illegally, 
over-full.  We are aware that in print and other ways downtown businesses 
encourage their employees to park in adjacent neighborhoods (effectively 
speaking, our neighborhood); all of us know UC-D staff, faculty and 
students who commute to Davis and park in our neighborhood.  We watch who 
parks, when and where they head, often on bicycles .  Our residential 
neighborhood has become a park-and-ride (or park-and-walk) lot for downtown 
and the university.

         The result is daily aggravation and frustration for neighborhood 
residents.  In addition to the noise (e.g., students returning late at 
night to pick up their cars) and congestion:
         -elderly who must shop, parents who must take children to medical 
appointments or school activities, often have to park many blocks from 
their home upon return from such errands;
         -repair or other service personnel are unable to park adjacent to 
homes when called for routine or emergency appointments;
         -our vehicles are sometimes immobilized because of crowding by 
nonresident vehicles;
         -we are routinely subject to aggressive/obnoxious parking by 
nonresidents who block sidewalks & handicap ramps, drive over and thus 
scatter yard waste piles and/or prevent their being removed by city crews, 
etc.
         In short, although the neighborhood has been reluctant to take the 
NIMBY approach of other Davis residential areas, we are feeling abused by 
that stance.

         Our options include:
         (a) a restrictive parking district, now set in motion, endorsed by 
many, and presented by the City as our only option within current policy;
         (b) a less restrictive, more creative solution, unlike that 
currently employed by the City in other neighborhoods around the core;
         (c) the status quo.
         We are discussing and debating amongst ourselves (a) and (b); (c) 
is not considered viable by most OND residents.

         I think you will find members of the ONDNA quite sympathetic to 
downtown business concerns.  We are, after all, close neighbors.  Many of 
us live in Old North because we enjoy and support locally-owned 
enterprises, along with the idea of a viable downtown.  However, please 
appreciate that with respect to week-day parking we are feeling beleaguered 
and frustrated, with good reasons (e.g., 90-minute re-designation; new 
parking standards).  We hope to be able to work with you on policies that 
might lessen your problems and ours, but will resist being seen simply as a 
(further) solution to downtown problems.

Parking Statistics, 500 and 600 blocks, B Street through F Street, complied 
by D. Dingemans:
*
Notes:
         As a rough estimate, Old North is hosting  200+ peak hour, 
non-resident automobiles in unrestricted parking.  For comparison, the BoA 
parking lot, 4th & E Streets, has 31 spaces.
         Because Old North parking fills from the southwest toward the 
northeast over the morning, the southwest portions are effectively 
saturated by 8:30 AM, several hours before the peak for the whole area.
         Because some non-residents autos are parked for days at a time, 
the overnight low includes residents and an unknown number of non-residents.
         At the peak the neighborhood is effectively full, making it 
impossible to find parking within several blocks of one's residence.


Bruce Winterhalder
Dept. Anthropology &
  Graduate Group in Ecology (Human Ecology, Area of Interest)
University of California at Davis
One Shields Avenue
Davis, CA   95616-8522

(530)-754-4770  [office]
(530)-752-0745  [Dept. office]
(530)-752-8885  [fax]
E-mail:  bwinterhalder at ucdavis.edu
Personal Web Page:  http://www.anthro.ucdavis.edu/winterweb/
Anthropology Faculty 
Page: 
http://www.anthro.ucdavis.edu/antnew/evolutionary/faculty/profiles/bpwinterhalder.aspx
Graduate Group in Ecology, Human Ecology AOE, Web Page: 
http://ecology.ucdavis.edu/humeco/humeco_home.htm  
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