New SO Parking lot.

I did not see any comment, perhaps you all missed the opening of the new parking lot on SO Ave. at Church.

In use as Valet parking for the SOPAC Galia event.

Is it now open for all?

It's paved and striped already? Wow!

It's striped but not paved. Looks like it's on gravel. I saw a sign that says blue permit parking

It won't be paved since there will be construction either this fall or Spring 2016 on Gateway 2.0

I went by today and noticed a sign that said it was available for "blue" permit holders (primarily those who had spots by the old ambulance corp.), but after a certain time each night it probably reverts to general parking.

Church Street Lot:

• Spaces are “Reserved” parking for Blue Tag resident commuters on a “First Come - First Serve” basis Monday thru Friday 5am to 9:30am.
• Spaces can be used by Green Tag business/employee permits on a “First Come - First Serve” basis Monday thru Friday after 9:30am.
• Five spaces signed and reserved for SOPAC employees 24/7.
• FREE shopper parking Monday thru Friday – 3 Hour Limit.
• FREE public parking all day Saturday and Sunday.
• No over-night parking 2am - 5am seven days a week.

At what time does free shopper parking commence on Monday - Friday?

9:30 am

Thank you.

Is dedicated parking for SOPAC employees a new thing? A permanent thing? Are they paying for the spaces like other local employees?

(duplicate deleted)

Susan 1014 you have raised a good point about the SOPAC employee parking. Odds are that payment for this has not been considered in which event we can just add the foregone revenue to their annual subsidy. Wasn't that subsidy supposed to have ended several years ago?

festus said:
Susan 1014 you have raised a good point about the SOPAC employee parking. Odds are that payment for this has not been considered in which event we can just add the foregone revenue to their annual subsidy. Wasn't that subsidy supposed to have ended several years ago?

As long as they're actually SOPAC employees, not Bow Tie employees, I'm fine with this...but there is nothing wrong with attaching a monetary value to this perquisite and including it in the cost of annual subsidy to SOPAC.

Having said that, I'm of the school that the huge blunder that was the decision to move forward with SOPAC is water under the bridge. The best we can do now with the white elephant is to optimize its operations to bring value to the community in terms of programming that works with its size constraints and is of interest to the community (as reflected in attendance), with an eye on the bottom line (ie, I harbor no delusions of re-purposing/shutting down/making the facility financially independent).

Going back to the free parking, if they're Bow Tie employees parking in those spots, I have a serious problem with it.

susan1014 said:
Is dedicated parking for SOPAC employees a new thing? A permanent thing? Are they paying for the spaces like other local employees?

The new owner of those properties has graciously agreed to allow them to be used as commuter parking until he is ready to break ground. He is also a Board member of SOPAC, and as such is certainly entitled to reserve a few spots for SOPAC employees. The entire lot will become a mixed use development in the future. In the mean time, the parking crunch caused by the Third and Valley development is somewhat improved.

Fair enough...if the lot owner wants to give SOPAC employees a few parking spaces, I'm fine with it. That should be his prerogative on his land.

SteveIvan, I quite agree with you about making SOPAC a success, whatever its history may be...I just wanted to make sure that someone in Village Hall hadn't decided that the employees there need free parking, while other downtown employees pay for it.

To be fair, this isn't just the graciousness of the property owner. The Village contributed $100,000 to the making of this parking lot (and tearing down of the building?), received from Jonathan Rose to help with short term transportation problems resulting from the sale of the Third and Valley parking lot.

I have long had a problem with the hypocracy of employee parking in town. It's expensive for local business employees, especially considering you're talking mostly about low hourly wage workers. While I like that it's in out of the way parking lots to free up spaces for customers, we're charging business employees close to $400 a year to park far away from their job. Yet, Village employees typically get to park closer to their jobs for free (the proximity to work has changed a little bit since the moving of Village offices but still).

You bring up a valid point, Susan, and I think that all employees in South Orange should be treated the same. In Maplewood, they charge something like a flat $50 a year for business employees to park in farther off lots and write that off as a benefit to the downtown for freeing up spaces for customers.

The Village should be leading by example, not "do as I say, not as I do."

I'd forgotten about the $100,000. The SOPAC workers should be paying for business parking permits (and perhaps are?), whether or not we allow spaces to be earmarked for them. Fishy is right (as usual!).

Cannot wait for construction to begin!

Cramer cleared up the issue of who paid for what in the other thread. See below. Bottom line is the Village wanted parking there, and they got it at no out of pocket expense.

Fishy, we can discuss downtown parking policy all we want, as there is certainly room for improvement. But that is a tangential issue.

cramer said:
Jonathan Rose's involvement is the $200,000 that it agreed to pay toward the improvement of the property to be used as temporary parking until the Third/Valley St. parking deck is completed. An agreement was never reached by the Village with Saiyd (no surprise) and the Village decided to use $100,000 for the replacement of jitneys. Ayuso paid for the demolition. The Village intends to use $100,000 for improvement of the lot for use as parking, although the question is how long the lot will be used for parking until construction starts.

Fishy, How far away do employees have to park? Maybe the question should be that the employer should provide or pay for parking for low-wage employees.

Mike, I really don't think adding another expense or cost of doing business to South Orange merchants is a good idea, especially right now. We're working really hard to rucruit businesses to South Orange, not drive them away.

Yes, many employees are low wage earners, but so are many business owners, just holding on until things [hopefully] get better. I bring home very little salary as the result of a heck of a lot of work but I have faith that things will get better. This would cost my business a thousand dollars a year and could cost others thousands and more. If one more piece is added to my overhead, I just don't know if I could swallow it... Especially considering other downtown employees (like those working for the Village) are parking for free.

South Orange needs to take Maplewood's lead and charge a more nominal fee ($50 a year, I believe) for employees to park in the underutilized lots. As a business owner, I'd be happy to pay THAT.

That lot has $100,000 worth of improvement????

marylago said:

That lot has $100,000 worth of improvement????

I don't know if some of the $100,000 is going towards rent paid by the Village to the owner of the lot. The original deal was that Jonathan Rose was going to contribute $200,000 to the Village for demolition of the buildings (as I recall) and improvement of the lot when Saiyd owned it. Ayuso paid for the demolition. I know that the Village was having a very difficult time reaching agreement with Saiyd, and I assumed that the problem was the rent that Sayid was demanding. But this is sheer speculation on my part.

btw - I think that it's an excellent idea to use $100,000 of the $200,000 to buy replacement jitneys. The Parking Authority didn't have the funds and the grants had run out.