SLO approves permanent parklet program with fees and design standards 

San Luis Obispo bars and restaurants that set up parklets for outdoor dining during the COVID-19 pandemic will be allowed to keep them under a permanent parklet program adopted by the City Council on July 5.

But the parking spaces—which the city has not charged for over the past two years—are going to start costing business owners. And the parklets themselves will need to meet more robust design and operational standards than before.

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• Photo Courtesy Of SLO City
• PRICE TO PARKLET San Luis Obispo is making the city's emergency parklet program permanent for a fee of more than $6,000 per parking space per year for business owners.

"You [the business owner can] decide whether it's worth the investment or not," City Councilmember Carlyn Christianson said during the July 5 meeting. "My basic thing is these are parking spaces—they're supposed to be for parking. If they are going to be used by private businesses to make money, then the city and community taxpayers need to be compensated."

The City Council unanimously approved permanent parklet program and greenlit a new fee structure that will charge businesses $6,760 per parking space per year. That fee covers parking meter revenue loss, weekly manual street sweeping, permit administration and inspections, and tree trimming over the parklet, according to the city.

The roughly 30 businesses with existing parklets in the city will have until Oct. 14 to apply for a new permit and pay a $908 application fee. Businesses that don't have parklets can also apply for one at any time, if they're eligible. Parklets are only allowed on streets with on-street parking, that have speed limits of 25 miles per hour or less.

In response to pleas from many in the business community to lower the proposed parklet fee, the City Council agreed to cut the rate recommended by city officials by 22 percent, from $8,710 to $6,760. The council also decided to waive fees for parklet space given to bike parking.

"Outside dining has been a wonderful addition to the beauty and vitality of downtown SLO," Woodstock's Pizza co-owner Laura Ambrose wrote in a letter to the city ahead of the meeting. "But please don't kill the program with fees that most of us cannot justify."

In arguing for lower fees, Mayor Erica Stewart noted that the public and the downtown—not just the participating businesses—have benefited from the parklet program, and added that the pandemic and its effects are still with us.

"I do think these parklets make it a more walkable downtown and I do think it's been very helpful for public health and safety," Stewart said. "[COVID-19] is still a concern for people."

SLO city officials, though, underscored that the parklet fees are generally important to establish so that the city can recoup the lost parking revenue from them—revenue that's going to be needed to pay for the $53.3 million new parking garage planned downtown.

According to the city, without any parklet fees, SLO loses about $264,000 in otherwise-collected annual parking revenue.

Greg Holt, owner of Big Sky Café downtown, said at the meeting that while the fees and design guidelines will be expensive for him to abide by, he understands the logic behind them. He said that Big Sky's parklet saved his restaurant during the pandemic.

"I look at this pricing for my parklets to turn permanent, the capital I'm going to have to [spend], and that's going to help create a parking structure," Holt said. "It's going to be expensive. I'm not going to have a choice. But it's for the best." Δ