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Statesville residents should speak out against parking plan
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Published: December 13, 2009
Please consider the merchants in our lovely town who are trying to make a living in the downtown area. Parallel parking will shrink the number of parking spaces, which we do not need. Less parking is not the answer.
What we really need from the City Council members is for them to put their heads together and try to find some way to fill the empty buildings with merchants so the citizens will have more shops to make purchases in.
Come on, everyone who would like the parking spaces in our downtown area to just be left as-is, with no changes. Speak up now or we will all be the losers - especially the merchants who are the backbone of our town.
I vote for no change.
Edrie Knight
Statesville
Downtown area needs more
parking and restaurants
In my opinion, there is an aspect to the question of downtown that is not being addressed. In the 21st century, there is no way that this can ever again be a shopping destination.
Shopping is an activity where people go from one store to another, a function only filled by shopping destinations such as malls, where one store is located next to another. This is true also of major cities, such as New York, which, in certain neighborhoods, offers the same kind of environment.
We offer a number of good and interesting specialty shops, as listed in today's R&L by Bethany Fuller, and, when my wife and I need an item probably available there, we come downtown to buy it. An alternative is also to visit a good restaurant, of which there should be more available, an idea I suggested some years ago.
In order to make this kind of shopping most convenient, parking should be as accessible as possible. Our present system of angle parking is the best solution, because parallel parking is much more time consuming, reduces available spaces and requires skill, which the majority of drivers native to this area have never had to learn. When I learned to drive, this skill had to be demonstrated to the inspector as part of the licensing process.
Don't change the present arrangement. In fact, expand it to Center Street if we open more stores and/or restaurants there.
Henry M. Gordon
Statesville
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