After some lengthy discussion at the Feb. 24 Vancouver City Council meeting, council members made the decision to move forward with a plan that will remove 393 parking spaces along Columbia Street and replace them with protected bike lanes as a part of the Westside Bike Mobility Project.
The plan, which was one of two options presented to city council members by city staff during the meeting, would remove those 393 parking spaces and replace them with the bike lanes along Columbia Street from Mill Plain Boulevard to 45th Street; 13th Street to Mill Plain; and Eighth Street to 13th Street.
Business owners in the areas that would be affected by this decision expressed frustration that the city council would decide on something that would remove that many parking spaces. Teri Wilson, who owns Doppelganger at 302 W. 8th St., said she is very disappointed in the city’s decision to do this, for myriad reasons.
“They seem to be looking to solve a problem that doesn’t exist,” Wilson said. “I’m here nearly every day of the week. Since this issue has been raised, I’ve paid close attention to bike traffic and I can tell you that it’s miniscule. A handful of bicyclists per day. Granted, it’s winter, but even in the summer there isn’t very much. Incidentally, the lion’s share of the traffic I do see are homeless people with bike trailers gathering aluminum cans.”
Wilson also pointed out that the parking spaces that will be removed are nearly always full. She said most of the spaces are used by patrons of downtown businesses who rely on that patronage to thrive.
“The more inconvenient the city makes it to shop, eat and use the personal services downtown, the faster businesses will dwindle in the downtown corridor,” she said. “I have several handicapped customers who rely on street parking to come shop and socialize. This will be exponentially more difficult for them without adequate, convenient parking.”
Michael Burgoyne, president of Laurus Wealth Management located at 314 W. 15th St., said he has talked with former county and city council members who cannot believe this is the course being taken, and “I fully concur.”
“It would seem that our area’s homelessness needs funding more than bike lanes for a limited few,” Burgoyne said. “We will lose 400 parking spaces and my guess is that is far fewer than that will use the bike corridor on a daily basis – particularly from November to May. In my conversations with members of community groups and business groups that rely on the Columbia corridor there was no one in favor of this proposal.”
Burgoyne also pointed out that he is a “bike enthusiast,” and said he has eight bikes in his garage. Philip Hopkins, a wealth adviser with Laurus, rides the 15 blocks down Columbia from his house to work often, Burgoyne said, and “neither of us are in favor of this change.”
“We will lose employee parking, customer parking and it will make ingress and egress into the building more difficult,” Burgoyne said. “Parking needs will not change, so more parking will be jammed into neighborhoods that already have dense parking problems.”
Although all of the council members expressed that they realized some sacrifices would need to be made in order to ensure more safety on the road, and that losing parking spaces could have a negative impact on some businesses and neighborhoods in the area, the only council member to oppose the plan was Bart Hansen.
Hansen expressed concerns over the recent lack of transparency in the process, and pointed out that there were many stakeholder groups that had been opposed to many of the prior options presented for this project.
“What have we achieved at this point?” Hansen asked. “We have a completely polarized community. Then suddenly there’s these only two options presented at the very end.”
Hansen expressed he would rather repave Columbia Street and then go back out to the community to engage more of the interested groups in order to come up with a safe and practical solution.
Council members were also presented with a second alternative, which would have resulted in the loss of 223 parking spaces. However, this option included an area of buffered bike lanes from 13th Street to Mill Plain, and the council members all agreed the first alternative was safer.
