Manhattan May Bar Valet Parking in Public Spaces

The City Council, responding to downtown merchants’ complaints about a new restaurant, tentatively decided this week to forbid valet parking services from using city streets or other public parking areas.

Dave Fansler opened the restaurant, Wiliker’s, on Manhattan Beach Boulevard in early November with 46 parking spaces, enough to meet city requirements. Jim Dolen, Wiliker’s general manager, said the valets have parked an average of 20 cars a day, most of them in the restaurant’s own lots.

But sometimes the valet service has used the public parking structure at Morningside Drive and Center Place, he said. The cars were parked on the seldom-used upper decks and the valets did not reserve or block off any public spaces, Dolen added.

Business Reportedly Down

David Arias, president of Manhattan Beach’s 129-member Downtown Business and Professional Assn., told the City Council this week that other restaurants are losing business because Wiliker’s valets are parking cars in public spaces.

Council members and business representatives said traffic problems would be unbearable if every restaurant were forced to offer valet parking, because cars would be parked in traffic lanes while valets took the wheel. They added that valet service would destroy the pedestrian atmosphere of the city.

The council unanimously voted to instruct the city staff to draw up an ordinance that would prohibit any business from valet parking in public spaces, including those in structures, on the streets and in lots.

Fansler agreed to stop valet parking in the city structure but reserved the right to valet park on streets and in other public parking spaces, including those at City Hall.

Service Free

Fansler said he has offered his valet service to all downtown businesses but the business association would not cooperate. He said people already have used his valet service--which is free except for tipping--when they go to other restaurants.

Council members and business representatives argued that most customers would not park at one restaurant and eat at another.

Dolen said if the proposed ordinance passes, customers will have to fight for spaces. He called the attempt to prohibit Wiliker’s valet use of public spaces a “witch hunt.”

Dolen said other restaurant managers have told them that their business has increased over last year, even though Wiliker’s is one of the largest restaurants in the area, with a 290-seat capacity.

Dolen said that Arias owns the property and the building Wiliker’s is leasing and that the two are in litigation involving the 30 off-site parking spaces and completion of the building. “Our viewpoint is that he’s using that downtown business association to benefit himself personally,” Dolen said in an interview.

Arias could not be reached for comment.

Councilmen Larry Dougharty and Bob Holmes said some of the Wiliker’s parking spaces have been used for storage and valets take cars to public spaces before the restaurant’s lots are full. Dougharty said Wiliker’s, as part of its conditional-use permit, must fill all its spaces before using public ones.

City Atty. Carl Newton said he has not studied the issue but believes that the city could legally ban valets from parking cars in public spaces. He said the issue will be discussed at the council’s Dec. 16 meeting.

Redondo Beach and Torrance have no restrictions on valet parking, officials there said.

Los Angeles has had problems with valet parking, according to Tom Conner, principal transportation engineer at the Office of Parking Management.

Valets have taken too many residential spaces, driven too fast, parked too close, blocked driveways and not paid meters unless an enforcement officer was approaching, he said. Some of the those problems have been alleviated, he added, by limiting parking hours on streets or allowing permit-only parking.

His office has discussed recommending to the City Council a prohibition of valet parking in public spaces but has no immediate plans to propose such restrictions, he said.