Oakland Grand Ave. businesses worried new project will take away parking spaces

OAKLAND, Calif. ( KRON ) – Oakland small business owners are concerned about a road project that would remove dozens of parking spaces.

The Oakland Department of Transportation is hoping to make Grand Avenue safer with a repaving project, but businesses along the corridor say more input is needed before moving ahead.

Grand Avenue is a busy corridor. Cars park in front of small businesses as cyclists make their way through the traffic.

OakDOT is proposing to improve safety along this road, but that includes getting rid of dozens of those parking spaces.

"Our concern is that if they take away easy access to our businesses, it's going to be a lot harder for our customers to be able to get to us," said veterinarian Elizabeth MacDonald.

She says the proposed removal of 30-40 parking spots would make life difficult for her clients, especially those who are elderly and with pets that need extra care.

Her business Grand Lake Veterinary Hospital and the Grand Avenue Business Association have been asking for input to share with OakDOT.

"We unfortunately haven’t been able to get much input to them. They have not really come down, they have not really talked to the merchants on the street, so we got permission that if we collected input that we could at least present it to them," MacDonald said.

OakDOT says Grand Avenue from Broadway to MacArthur Boulevard needs to be repaved to cut down on a high number of bicycle and pedestrian accidents. The proposed improvements include new crosswalks, protected bike lanes and turning angled parking spaces into parallel parking.

MacDonald says she and other business owners are all for safety but a more balanced approach needs to be taken. She thinks losing the parking spaces might be a death blow to already struggling merchants.

"We'd rather they slow down traffic and maybe have less lanes but accomodate for both parking and safe biking, not have the solution be 30 to 40 parking spots taken away, affecting businesses' ability to have customers come," she said.

MacDonald is expecting to present the parking survey findings to OakDOT next month. Then it's a waiting game to see if transportation officials will revise their plans.

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