San Mateo has extended its downtown temporary street closure and parklet program until September to help restaurant operations outdoors, with plans to discuss potential permanent street closures before the new extension expires.
The temporary street closures and use of parklets were set to expire on March 1 but will now extend until Sept. 30. In June, the City Council temporarily closed parts of South B Street between First and Third avenues and the southbound lane between Baldwin and First avenues to vehicles to accommodate restaurants. Outdoor dining was allowed to return on Jan. 25. City officials are also exploring a seasonal or permanent street closure program, which they will discuss well before the Sept. 30 temporary extension deadline, after the city found support for a permanent program following discussions with restaurants and businesses downtown, said Assistant City Manager Kathy Kleinbaum.
Councilwoman Amourence Lee said when conversations start about permanent street closures, she likes the idea of permanent street closures being privately controlled but still having public spaces available with public trees, a stage for music or a playground.
“If we get to the place where there’s a permanent closure of the entire street, like a section of B Street, I would love for the city to step up and also have some publicly controlled spaces and talk through what a vision of that could be,” Lee said.
The City Council also heard a presentation for a potential long-term parklet program downtown, which it and restaurants support. A parklet is a sidewalk extension installed on top of parking lanes or spaces that provide seating and can be placed outside restaurants. Many downtown restaurants have set up parklets outside to have outdoor dining, helping many restaurants to stay in business. It would be a yearlong program but would be different than the current temporary one, with the city charging fees for the parklet or banning roofs on top of the parklets. The city currently does not charge parklet fees, and many parklets have roofs, Plexiglas or barricades.
Questions remain about if the parklets would be allowed throughout the city, if they would be public or private places, how many parking spaces a parklet can use, fee costs and if there would be limits on how many are allowed in San Mateo. City staff recommended parklets be permitted throughout the city, that they be privately controlled by the business that installed them, a maximum of two parallel or three diagonal spaces be used for space and that the city should wait and see about a numbers cap. Staff also said there should be a $500 application fee and an annual encroachment fee at $1,000 per parking space used. Meter revenue loss due to parking spaces being used is about $1,000 per space.
The City Council was supportive of the program and most staff recommendations. Deputy Mayor Rick Bonilla supported a year-round program and private control of parklets.
“I think we should definitely transition to a permanent parklet program, and I like that we have actually designed the spaces that would be allowed in front of the stores and that the restaurants themselves do pay a fee,” Bonilla said.
For the long-term parklet program, Lee asked the city to look into potential fee reductions, waivers or payment plans to businesses that demonstrate a financial need due to the pandemic.
“For the businesses that have made these investments to build out the parklets and are still alive after everything that we have all been through, I just want to make sure that we are supporting them procedurally, administratively and also financially if there is bandwidth to do that,” Lee said.
In other business, San Mateo City Hall reopened on Monday in a limited capacity, with staff using Conference Room C instead of the atrium due to construction. The library is setting up additional mobile hot spots, and Chromebooks will be available to the public later in February. The San Mateo County Event Center currently operates as a mass vaccination site, and major construction is happening for the San Mateo Underground Flow Equalization System Project. The city and county are working together on traffic control plans. King, Los Prados and Bayside Joinville fields are also now open on weekends.
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February 03, 2021 at 07:30PM
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San Mateo extends street closures | Local News | smdailyjournal.com - San Mateo Daily Journal
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