By Charly SHELTON

With the pandemic shutdown restrictions slowly starting to ease, restaurants and businesses are beginning to reopen with new rules for their diners and shoppers to stay safe and slow the growth of the second wave of the pandemic. Among these new policies from the LA County Dept. of Public Health on how to conduct business in the brave new post-COVID world is to “expand outdoor seating where possible, in compliance with local zoning codes. For outdoor seating, maintain six-feet physical distancing standards.” With this in mind, the City of Glendale has proposed a temporary solution to comply with the standard while allowing for continued social distancing. K-rails, large concrete divider walls similar to what are seen dividing the two directional sides of a freeway, will be laid down along the back edge of select parking space areas on Honolulu Avenue in the Montrose Shopping Park to create a safe space for diners to eat outside.

“The idea, we’re calling Al Fresco Glendale, is to expand some of the restaurant space to the outside,” said Philip Lanzafame, director of Community Development for the City of Glendale. “[The restaurants are] going to be limited when they can re-open to whatever the county sets as the protocol, whether that’s 25% or 50% or whatever. So the idea was we can create what we call parklets in the parking area to expand that space and allow restaurants to come outside to expand their capacity.”

The parklets will be cordoned off with the K-rails to protect diners, and then the inside of the area will be made to feel more park-like with the addition of planters, park benches and other relaxation areas for the shoppers taking a break as well as restaurant diners. For restaurant owners in the Shopping Park, this is good news albeit a little presumptive. Merchants hadn’t been fully informed of the coming parklets before signs went up last week informing of the change to the affected parking spaces. When several merchants and restaurateurs called the City to inquire what was happening, the signs were pulled down to allow time for further, more in-depth discussion.

When the signs went up and some merchants contacted the City, other issues were brought up in relation to the parklets and the use, specifically, of parking spaces for the project. Parking has long been a sore issue with the City of Glendale to balance the parking needs of the businesses versus the cost and impact of building structures or facilities for parking.

“We told them that parking is one of our biggest problems and the [outside expansions] that they’re trying to do … they need to understand that we have to make sure that this doesn’t impose on anybody’s business. They’re very sensitive to that, to be honest with you. In the meetings that we have over Zoom with the City of Glendale, they’re pretty receptive. There’s no imposition or anything like that,” said Andre Ordubegian, president of the Montrose Shopping Park. “They really know everybody’s hurting. They’ve been closed for three months and people are still afraid. So they’re trying to create an ambiance for people to come by and actually see that you can come and shop and everything is okay.”

This option is one that has been floated as a possibility for several months in one way or another on both ends, from the individual merchants and restaurateurs as well as from the City, while other options have ranged from just living with minimized capacity to closing down all of Honolulu Avenue to motor traffic, and everywhere in between. But the final test for the parklets will be whether or not the customers return.

“I mean, frankly, [the parklet] sounds kind of neat all by itself,” said Jim Collins, owner of Town Kitchen and Grill. “The question is will consumers want to sit in this space that’s so close to Honololu, which will be open; will consumers want to sit in the space that’s so close to the traffic going by and will the parking impediment create a deeper challenge for the businesses that are already so fragile?”

One sentiment that was echoed by all merchants and restaurateurs interviewed is that the City of Glendale has been nothing but supportive and wonderful, and is working tirelessly to help each and every business recover as quickly and as smoothly as possible in this time of need.

“The great news to me is that the city’s reaction to the [inquiry over the hastily hung signs] was ‘Hey, you know what? You’re right. We’re going to come up and knock on doors and talk to a bunch of merchants and hear from you all.’ It’s phenomenal. It was the best possible response,” Collins said.

The City is taking the time to speak to the other merchants and restaurateurs in the Shopping Park over the next week or so and, upon completion, a fresh set of signs will be hung to inform guests of the Shopping Park what parking areas will be designated parklets for the time until social distancing rules are lifted.

  Charly Shelton