Nicholas Katzban, Staff Writer, @NicholasKatzban
Ridgewood Councilman Ramon Hache sees one downside to restaurant valet service as towns across North Jersey try to boost their central business districts.
“Valet parking is great because each car that pulls into a valet lot is a car that’s not driving around the block over and over,” Hache said. “But for other businesses, that customer is not walking past other retailers.”
On Monday, Hache visited businesses along East Ridgewood Avenue to gauge their interest in a municipally run downtown valet service, which will begin a three-month pilot program on Friday, running through the end of December.
With a municipally operated valet service, he said, people dining downtown can enjoy the convenience of valet parking without the downside of door-to-door privatized valets, which can reduce impulse shopping at other businesses. Instead, customers can walk a few blocks back to the village’s valet station, passing other shops and cafes.
Each Friday and Saturday night, the angled parking along the west side of Van Neste Square and the commuter lot on South Broad Street will be closed at 4:30 p.m. Then, from 6 p.m. until 1 a.m. the village will offer valet service to anyone shopping or dining downtown.
How much is the going to cost the taxpayer? Do you have any idea Hache ? Do you really care ?
For one thing, I am not a fan of valet parking. I wouldn’t let ANYONE touch my car. So, if I park my car in a “valet” spot at 4:15 to patronize some local businesses, I need to move it by 4:30? Well, then I guess I will go to some other town or mall to do business
I will never use this and pay $5 for a parking space that has historically been free after 6 PM (except for that brief glitch when it was 8 PM).
I’m starting to hate the restaurants. This would never have happened if so many hadn’t arrived.
Does this mean that the private businesses who offer valet are still going to have their own “valet stations” all over town as they are now PLUS the extra loss of spots when the Village Valet is working? So in order to free up a few spots–not the prime ones that “private valet stations” are using– we give up more? And most handicap spots have long been gone. I guarantee you that I am not capable of walking blocks just to enjoy the “scenic Ridgewood’s” closed stores. We have enjoyed going to certain Ridgewood restaurants but I guess it’s time to permanently join our older handicapped friends and start boycotting Ridgewood. I know the Village is trying to pull in “the movers and shakers” of surrounding communities. They probably won’t even notice a final decline in older “stogy” customers!
Vote for Paul Vagianos.
There’s no mention whatsoever of this new valet parking program on either the Ridgewood Chamber of Commerce or Ridgewood Guild web sites. Has either organization even been informed of what’s going on?
How do I find out what businesses are going to validate my parking? Does Ramon have the list?
The steady erosion of true public parking options in Ridgewood will decrease the number of patrons of Ridgewood businesses.
Go to the lot behind Bookends. The majority of the employee only spaces are either empty or filled with non-employee vehicles. Often every single regular parking spot is filled, which pressures people to risk a ticket by parking in the employee only spaces.
The number of designated employee spaces far exceeds the usage by employees. I have seen this on weekdays, evenings, and on weekends. There are routinely more empty employee parking spaces than spaces in use, which is a massive waste given the perennial parking problems in Ridgewood.
Is the real goal of the valet parking in formerly public spaces and the designated employee spaces revue from tickets?
I have already reduced my usage of downtown Ridgewood because of the parking problems. How much money has the Village wasted on parking studies over the past 20 years without ever acting to add to the available parking? The cost of the studies in that time would have paid for an additional parking structure over an existing lot, which would not have required any of the expensive and litigation prone processes of acquiring additional property.
Mismanagement of the parking situation will hurt the businesses the parking should support. Without those businesses and the taxes they pay, the Village budged would be in dire straits indeed.
Job one Pave line and re illuminate the existing suface lots
Thats it folks.cottage hudson walnut craters of Hell get it yet??
Town shud never build for peaks loosers bet on taxpapers Dimes