Vote on Borders Permit Postponed

Capitola-A Borders Books & Music store proposal stalled at a City Council meeting Thursday night.

Plans for the project got backed up on the subject of traffic and parking, as well as behind dozens of residents who wanted to weigh in at the public hearing. Capitola City Council Chamber was packed with more than 200 people, many of whom wore little yellow tags on their shirts reading, "No big box stores on Bay Avenue" and "Big box stores eat," and many of whose hands shot up when Capitola Mayor Tony Gualtieri asked who wanted to speak on the subject of a conditional-use permit for the bookstore.

"This is an emotional issue," Gualtieri said, having noted he received about 85 letters and 50 phone calls on matter of issuing a permit to the chain bookstore, which plans to occupy a 25,000-square-foot space at the shopping center now under construction on Bay Avenue near Highway 1.

Council members decided to hold a special meeting at 7 p.m. Wednesday to continue the public hearing.

But someone expecting a heated philosophical debate pitting independent bookstores against chain stores was instead treated Thursday night to a technical explanation of "shared parking" and to different experts' expectations of parking demand.

In the applicant's opening statement, Doug Ley of Redtree Properties Inc., which is developing the $17 million Capitola Crossings shopping center, said he hoped the council would not reconsider parking and traffic issues he felt had already been settled. "It's not appropriate to reconsider the parking analysis." Ley said. "They were examined, they were considered, and they were resolved." However, a civil engineer for Redtree proceeded to go over a detailed analysis about why the shared parking plan was adequate. The standards used in determining the amount of space necessary had been used for similar sites, the engineer said.

Lawyer Ashley Winn, representing the owners of the Capitola Book Café, countered, arguing that the Borders store calls for more parking than would be available under the developers' current plan. He also argued that a Borders store at the location was inconsistent with the city's General Plan, which sets a goal of "maintaining Capitola's existing small town scale, character, and flavor."A planning consultant, appearing for Winn, said the data used to determine the parking requirements was dated-at least to 1983. "There's not sufficient parking for the site," he said.

Story by John Sanford, Sentinel correspondent.

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