As Santa Rosa study finds thousands of downtown parking spaces go unused, housing advocates see opportunity

Does the heart of Santa Rosa have too much parking?

A city-commissioned study of downtown parking recently raised that question and returned with answers certain to stoke the debate about what to do with city-owned land, including five garages and nine lots that together with private parking make up a quarter of downtown.

Most of that parking goes unused, even during the highest periods of use, the city found.

The analysis of on-street parking, surface lots and parking garages between October and April found 74% of the more than 8,700 public and private parking spots were vacant during peak hours.

Some city leaders and housing advocates say there’s a better use for that land.

“I found the report both embarrassing and exciting,” said Adrian Covert, founder of grassroots group Santa Rosa YIMBY, a play on the acronym for Not In My Backyard, which seeks to create an affordable, walkable and sustainable city.

“We’re bleeding tax dollars on a bunch of empty spaces but it’s exciting because we can think about how to redevelop those spaces into a vibrant downtown in the future,” he said.

The parking study, presented to the City Council on Aug. 23, was the first of three discussions related to city-owned downtown assets. The council in October is expected to create a shortlist of properties that the city will target for redevelopment.

Santa Rosa has long looked at infill redevelopment to spur housing and commercial growth downtown, and has added incentives in recent years to lure developers, including eased height limits and parking requirements.

City administrators have eyed parking lots and garages in particular as prime candidates for construction, in part because of low use.

The surplus of parking has implications for taxpayer coffers, too.

The city’s parking enterprise fund, which pays for operations and maintenance of parking, has been operating at a deficit for the past three years and some of the city garages need millions of dollars in repairs.

But some downtown business and property owners worry getting rid of parking could burden already struggling merchants by making it harder for people to come downtown and could create a shortage of parking in the future once more units are built.

About a quarter of spaces used

There are roughly 4,500 public parking spaces downtown, including about 2,800 spaces in the five public garages, nearly 700 across nine surface lots and about 1,000 metered parking spaces. There’s an additional 4,130 private spaces, including those in the largest garage connected to the Santa Rosa Plaza mall.

The study, completed in June, provided one of the first post-pandemic looks at parking use.

Analysts with Walker Consultants found occupancy rates had not bounced back since the crisis forced people to stay home and shifted work away from offices.

At peak times, only about 30% of city-owned parking was in use, and that dropped to 26% when including private parking, the study found.

That means about 6,400 public and private spaces sat empty much of the time.

Use remained relatively flat month to month over the seven-month study period. Public garages saw the lowest use.

Even during one of the busiest times of the year, the annual Pliny the Younger beer release, which this year generated a record $6.1 million in economic impact for Sonoma County, just 45% of parking spaces were occupied.

Parking use was down about 16% from 2019, the study found.

A similar study conducted in 2019 found public parking during peak times was 57% occupied and 42% of all parking downtown, including private spaces, was in use during those times.

Chrissy Mancini, of Walker Consultants, said parking use post-pandemic was low compared to other cities the firm has studied where parking has returned or even exceeded pre-pandemic rates. Cities with more public employees in the urban center have not seen use climb as quickly, she told the council during the presentation.

Mayor Chris Rogers, whose district includes downtown, called the data “astounding" and said during the meeting it begs having a discussion about how some of those city properties can be transformed.

Redeveloping city properties should be on the table if Santa Rosa is to increase housing downtown, Rogers added in an interview

“One of the ways we can impact housing is to put our own skin in the game and use our parking lots, our land,” he said.

The data also piqued the interest of housing advocates who see prime opportunities for redevelopment.

‘A place to drive and store cars’

Covert, of the Santa Rosa YIMBY group, was cycling downtown recently when he approached Santa Rosa Plaza and wondered what the area looked like before the large mall was built. In his day job, he is senior vice president of public policy for the Bay Area Council, a business coalition active in economic development issues.

“It just felt wrong,” he said, speaking as a citizen, of the divide in downtown, split by the enclosed shopping center and adjacent Highway 101. “Railroad Square is dangling from Old Courthouse Square like a phantom limb wanting to be attached and then you have this mall with parking the size of nine football fields.”

He began combing through detailed fire insurance maps from the early- to mid-1900s produced by Sanborn Map Company. The maps painted a picture of a different downtown with hundreds of homes and businesses.

That was before the 1969 earthquake that destroyed more than 100 buildings, including 13 hotels and other downtown establishments, forcing the city into a quandary about how to rebuild its commercial core. Twelve years of controversy and 21 lawsuits followed before Santa Rosa Plaza opened in 1983.

Covert’s search found that 63% of the land used for parking was once housing and that little of the parking was developed on open land. Dozens of storefronts, churches, a theater, bowling alley and even the city’s small Chinatown district on Second Street once stood where there is now parking.

He questioned whether Santa Rosa needed all those spaces.

The 2019 parking study and the recent data cemented what he already suspected: There’s a surplus of parking downtown.

“From a land-use perspective, downtown Santa Rosa is a place to drive and store cars, but I think we have one of the most exciting redevelopment opportunities in the North Bay,” Covert said.

Covert said transforming city parking could be one of the easiest ways to speed a goal of increasing housing in the city’s urban center. The latest plan for the 720-acre downtown area, approved in late 2020, aims to add 7,000 new homes by 2040, an ambitious goal that has eluded the city in the past.

Replacing parking with housing and enhancing bike and pedestrian infrastructure will create a more vibrant and inviting downtown, draw more shoppers and create a larger employee pool for local businesses, according to Covert and other advocates for downtown transformation.

Infill redevelopment downtown can preserve green space, limit construction in outlying areas that are at higher risk of wildfires and allow developers to boost density by building up, not out, the housing allies say.

Cal Weeks, policy director for Sonoma County nonprofit Generation Housing, which promotes affordable housing development, said the city should target parking if it’s serious about building more housing.

Weeks and Covert said the Third Street and D Street garages and the lot at the former White House department store site on Third and E streets would be best to redevelop.

The garages, which are more than 50 years old, need up to $12 million in repairs. Repairing the structures isn’t a good use of taxpayer money since there is so much parking nearby, advocates said.

“Investing our city dollars into those structures doesn’t make a lot of sense when there is a more utilitarian use for those sites,” Weeks said.

A plan to redevelop the Third Street garage was halted earlier this year after opposition from the business community.

Mayor Rogers said he would want to put all the properties on the table, solicit feedback from developers and the community and see what opportunities exist for redevelopment. Transforming individual lots one at a time could be tougher because the city could run into opposition like it did with the Third Street garage, he said.

That doesn’t mean the city is looking to get rid of all parking downtown, he said. The city will also have to determine how much parking is needed in the future as part of this process, he said.

Business interests wary of redevelopment

Recent proposals to redevelop parking garages and lots have rankled some in the business community who are wary that redevelopment could harm downtown commerce. Downtown merchants and property owners say they’re not opposed to housing but stress the city should be strategic in which properties it redevelops.

Bernie Schwartz, co-owner of California Luggage Co. on Fourth Street, said new housing units of all income levels are needed to help revive the area, which is struggling with vacancies and business turnover, especially coming out of the pandemic.

He recognized there is plenty of parking downtown but noted that if some of the lots and garages closest to Fourth Street are redeveloped it could be a hassle for employees and customers at the restaurants, bars and shops.

Three of the busiest parking properties downtown are the two surface lots on Fifth Street and the Third Street garage, according to the parking study. (Even the garage and the lot on Fifth and D streets didn’t surpass 69% occupancy at peak hours, according to the city, and although the Fifth and B street lot was often between 70% to 84% full, it only has 64 spaces.)

The city should focus on redeveloping lots and garages outside Fourth Street core first, said Schwartz, who has operated his business downtown for 42 years.

Developer Hugh Futrell, whose company is behind a number of housing and commercial projects downtown, said though there is surplus parking now, the city should be careful about reducing garage space.

Retailers, office tenants and residents will need the parking if housing units are added downtown bringing more people, said Futrell who is vice chair of the Downtown Action Organization, a group affiliated with the Santa Rosa Metro Chamber that oversees a taxing entity formed to promote the city center. The group opposed plans to redevelop the Third Street garage.

“The garage surplus disappears if we meet our general plan goals,” Futrell wrote in an email.

Weeks, of Generation Housing, said smart parking policies would address concerns about a lack of parking in the future. The city should partner with owners of private parking lots to share the space or incentivize property owners to lease spaces in the evenings and on weekends, he said.

Enhancing pedestrian and bike infrastructure would also reduce the number of parking spaces needed and cars on the road, he said.

While redevelopment could create noise, dust and other temporary challenges, the long-term benefits outstrip the inconvenience, he said.

“Small businesses are the lifeblood of our community and what makes downtown Santa Rosa so special, but I really do believe that they are going to see a boom from people moving downtown,” he said.

You can reach Staff Writer Paulina Pineda at 707-521-5268 or paulina.pineda@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @paulinapineda22.