This proposed $20 million City Hall parking structure is ill-considerd. It is a violation of existing city plans. It will provide free and subsidized parking for google and for City Hall employees at great taxpayer expense and contrary to stated City goals to promote use of transportation alternatives.

If the parking is indeed needed it can be had at a much smaller cost to taxpayers by adding on-street parking to Division and Fifth Ave and/or by adding floors to the Ann-Ashley structure or Liberty Square structure.

A fellow downtown small businessperson called me today very upset about this proposal. Apparently city staffer Tom Crawford had called him (the owner of Tio’s) saying the structure was a “done deal” and asking how much did he want for his leasehold interest in the property.

“What?” I said. It is not a done deal and the City has a very long way to go to take by eminent domain this property from unwilling sellers.

Who is running the city now?! It is certainly time to throw out the councilpeople trying to strongarm and fleece the taxpayers. And maybe to show the door to Roger Fraser, our City Administrator who doesn’t even live in the City and pay taxes here. Ron I am glad to have you on council. I only ask you to inquire of your colleagues who supports this bad idea and post their emails here so voters can let them know how we feel.

The city council is determined to ram through the highly questionable
above-ground parking structure on the east side of the city hall despite the fact that this is in conflict with the recent parking study by Nelson Nygard and is in conflict with the upcoming Design Review Guidelines which go before council on October 8.

The proposed parking structure will loom over the Old Fourth Ward residential neighborhood and has not be subjected to any public process or scrutiny. In fact, citizen input coming from the recent A2D2 parking report is being COMPLETELY ignored. TheNelson Nygard report calls for NO MORE ABOVE GROUND PARKING STRUCTURES!

Some council members were finally forced to admit that this ABOVE GROUND PARKING STRUCTURE is being built on the edge of a residential area to serve more-or-less the needs of the State Street Area and specifically their ambitions for Google.

Should any residental neightborhood be forced to accept such a negative impact, with no public process, and in conflict with city plans because city oligarchs have decided to shove it through?

The city has already paid thousands of dollars for the A2D2 studies and plans. They includes endless hours of citizen participation and input. Why are they wasting this money on studies and reports, no to mention the volunteer time of citizens, if they have not intention of listening. Why are they then ignoring the parking study and trying to impose this exhorbitantly expensive and highly questionable project on this community without even the input, much less the approval of the Ann Arbor community. Who is running the show here? Is city council working on behalf of the citizens who elected them and pay them?

This parking structure must be stopped. The whole city hall project has to be subjected to carefull analysis and scrutiny.

This entire issue is being rammed through without citizens input and despite the fact that fiscal realities are not being addressed. City Council is trying to push this through before Sabra Briere and Mike Anglin take there seats on the council.

Speak out on this issue. The citizens of this community have made it very clear through their endless participation in the A2D2 process that this is not what they want. And we certainly don’t need our residential neighborhoods eroded by turning them into parking venues for the commercial interests of State Street.

Before the city spends close to 20 million to build another parking structure, I think we need to look at other alternatives. For example, I’ve been told that AATA park and ride lots are full.

http://www.a2dda.org/index.php?page=datareports