Officials report progress on State Street
Richard Yates, who owns Opal Restaurant, shows a trapdoor of his parklet to Sarah Clark during her recent inspections on State Street in downtown Santa Barbara.
More and more downtown Santa Barbara restaurants with outdoor dining parklets are making the adjustments necessary to comply with the city’s new stormwater runoff requirements, city officials said.
The changes, required as of Dec. 1, are needed to allow rainwater to flow uninterrupted down the street instead of being allowed to accumulate and flood storefronts and sidewalks on lower State Street.
A first round of inspections showed only 17 out of the 50 outdoor parklets between the 400 and 1300 blocks of State Street were compliant with the new stormwater requirements, while 33 were not. They were given written correction notices with a five-day deadline to correct the violations.
A second round of inspections last week showed the number of delinquent parklets has been cut dramatically.
“Twelve facilities remain non-compliant, with four additional facilities due for inspections tomorrow,” Sarah Clark, downtown plaza parking manager, told the News-Press Monday.
So it’s possible there could be 16 parklets out of compliance with the new requirements, even though that still cuts the number of delinquent parklets in half.
All restaurants with unaltered parklets that could impede stormwater runoff will be sent a second administrative citation later this week, Ms. Clark said.
“The administrative citations will give a second compliance date, and we’ll do another follow-up inspection,” she said.
She said that in most cases, restaurants have complied with the new requirements by cutting drainage channels and using steel diamond plate to bridge the gap. Others have pulled their parklets away from the curb and made them narrow.
“A few have removed platforms and switched to portable, at-grade designs,” Ms. Clark said.
Asked whether restaurant owners with cited parklets were being stubborn/defiant, were cash-strapped and unable to afford to make the necessary changes or were simply at a loss as to how to proceed, she said, “I don’t want to speculate.”
Asked how State Street weathered the rain last weekend, she said the downtown thoroughfare got through it OK without any flooding-related problems.
“State Street fared well,” she said. “We did not have to remove any parklets due to storm flows.”
Parklets that were in operation as of Sept. 20 are not required to be made portable, so many of the existing facilities are not. Newly constructed parklets must be designed to be portable.
Staff has vowed that in the event of a big storm, any parklet that is not portable and blocks the flow of stormwater will be moved to ensure there is no flooding onto the sidewalks, and that the owner will be billed for the expense.email: nhartsteinnewspress@gmail.com
