Long Branch business owners vow to challenge a plan to remove their angled parking spots along the south side of Lake Shore Blvd. W., to install parallel parking and a widened sidewalk and patios.
Business owners say the removal of the angled parking means they will lose business since they will not be able to provide ample parking for their customers.
“We do not have laneway parking and the delivery trucks will have to park on the road and disrupt traffic flow,” said Corey Bowes, an official of the Long Branch Business Improvement Association.
He said it took quite a fight years ago to have the angled parking installed, mostly due to a lack of parking in the area.
LONG BRANCH business owners vow to contest the removal of their angled parking spots
Business people in the area say they already suffer slow sales due to an ongoing watermain installation project which has disrupted traffic flow. They warn a sidewalk installation project will mean more construction and less sales.
“Angled parking allows more cars to park per meter of sidewalk than parallel parking, so it’s a very efficient way to make parking available on this busy street,” according to a Long Branch Neighbourhood website.
Councillor Mark Grimes in a June 9 letter requested the General Manager, of the City’s Transportation Services, report back by April next year of a ‘conceptual design to replace the angle parking between 3285 and 3809 Lake Shore Blvd. W.’
City staff are to report back with a “more detailed design and funding sources.”
Grimes said Lake Shore Boulevard West is classified as a “major arterial,” with two lanes in each direction with TTC streetcars sharing the inside with other traffic, and bike lanes designated on both sides of the road.
SIGN of the times
He said the road “is configured to allow angled parking, which protrudes onto the sidewalk and makes reversing out of parking spots into traffic potentially dangerous due to other parked vehicles restricting visibility of oncoming vehicular and bicycle traffic.”
“The public realm along Lake Shore Boulevard West would be greatly improved by replacing the angled parking with parallel parking spots and widening the sidewalk to allow more room for pedestrians, streetscape beautification, and restaurant patios,” Grimes wrote.
“Given that there is no major capital construction scheduled for this area in the next five years, having a conceptual plan in place would allow for the work to be undertaken through potential future private development,” he told City staff.
Etobicoke York Community Council in 2017 approved a Parking and Streetscape Pilot Project on Lake Shore Boulevard West, between Thirty Sixth Street and Thirty Seventh Street, with a conceptual design, cost and parking supply implications. The pilot project was never implemented