Loss of Parking Spaces Draws Public Outrage

The removal of a parking area in front of the Van Nuys Civic Center Post Office for security reasons is drawing the ire of customers who say they are being inconvenienced.

In all, nine metered spaces with half-hour limits and one handicapped space were removed last month at the request of an official with the General Services Administration, the federal agency that is is responsible for the management of federal buildings.

On June 19, Curtis A. Phelps, an assistant field office manager with the West Los Angeles GSA office, sent a letter to Irwin Chodash, a city Department of Transportation engineer, requesting the change.

“In light of what has occurred in . . . Oklahoma City’s bombing these parking meters pose a serious security breach, and I would like to have them removed and parking restricted at that location,” Phelps said in the letter.

Neighborhood activists, however, said the security risk is minimal and that Phelps did not have the authority to make the request.

“We need the parking put back the way it was,” said Michael Walker, whose Van Nuys Community Action Group has initiated a campaign to restore the spaces.

“This is a terrible inconvenience, especially for handicapped people who now have to park two blocks away.”

Walker said his group is angry that the city removed the parking zone without receiving public input and without conducting a traffic study in the area.

City transportation officials and postal officials said they have received a steady stream of complaints since the former parking area was turned into a red zone in mid-July.

The office of Councilman Marvin Braude, whose district includes the post office, has also received complaints, a spokeswoman said.

Scott DeYoung, a management analyst with the Department of Transportation, said the heavy congestion in the area--due to the court, library, state and other buildings in the Civic Center--makes the loss of parking spaces a significant concern.

“People are not happy,” DeYoung said. “They feel it’s hard to do their business at the post office without those spaces.”

DeYoung said city officials plan to meet with federal officials and community representatives to address the complaints.

Federal officials were not available for comment.