With preferential parking, residents have to pay to park in front of their own homes.
The November 30 Musing about having to use an app to park in the Topa/Bank of America parking lot garnered a lot of attention.
A REMINDER ABOUT CARUSO’S PROMISES:
One woman wrote, “In the Alphabet Streets with permit parking, people have to buy permits to park in front of their own homes—and streets that don’t have permit parking have Caruso Village employees parking in front of our houses – although Caruso signed an agreement promising all employees would park on site.”
BID COMMITTEE CAN’T ADDRESS THE ISSUE:
The Pacific Palisades Business Improvement District board met today on Zoom and the parking dilemma at the Topa/BofA lot came up. Most recently, anyone wanting to park there had to have an app launched by Metropolis Technologies that requires the driver’s name, cell-phone number, email address, license plate number and credit card information, as well as the make, model and year of the vehicle.
One BID member said these demands are so unpleasant that “I’m not going to park there anymore.”
The board decided that it was not in the BID bylaws to address an issue like this, but board member Susan Carroll, owner of Gift Garden Antiques on Antioch said: “Topa will hear about it from customers.”
Topa Property Group owns the Business Block Building and currently leases street-level space to Bank of America, Starbucks, Casa Nostra, Café Vida, Cathay Palisades and Sotheby’s International Real Estate.
COURTESY AT GROCERY STORE PARKING LOTS:
Another resident wrote, “Toward the end of the article, a reader is quoted as saying that they might have to start parking at Gelson’s rather than using a parking app. I am strongly against parking at a store or market parking lot for any purpose other than patronizing that place. Those who park in such a lot for any other purpose are taking spots from people who really want to shop. Shoppers, please consider other options, including a metered spot or a spot on a street with no meter.”
MIDWEST ADVANTAGES:
And a fly-over country reader commented: “Yep … no paying for parking here! And the app monitors your internet usage [in the story]. I say it again — the Midwest may not be so bad.”
Oh! But those South Dakota winters!!
You need to read the LA Times article on Metropolis, it’s not just that the app takes your payment info, they also track you on your phone and can sell your data, it’s a major issue and people need to figure out how to get it stopped, by pressuring the landlords and refusing to use it, unless of course they think Bonin will ban payment apps to prevent from being recalled.