James M. Corcoran
Guest Column

An informal survey of the downtown area (Maple Ave. on the West, Reckless Place on the South, Spring Street on the East and the Navesink River to the North) identified 4,279 public and private parking spaces. Private spaces number 2,202 and public spaces 2,077. This is far more than adequate to service the business and retail trade.

A retail parking formula of 4.5 cars for each 1,000 square feet of retail floor space is a parking industry benchmark. The downtown has approximately 175,000 square feet. of retail space (first-floor selling area, excluding storage and basements) that would require 787.5 parking spaces using the formula.

The downtown’s 4,279 spaces are over four times greater than required.

Even if you eliminate the private parking spaces, the public parking spaces, lots, street meters, permit parking and curbside parking of 2,077 spaces, are more than adequate.

The fact is that downtown Red Bank is saturated with parking spaces.

To put the benchmark in perspective, two local shopping malls, the Monmouth Mall in Eatontown and The Grove at Shrewsbury are well below the current Red Bank ratio. The Grove has 513 parking spaces serving 148,171 square feet of retail space and the Monmouth Mall has 7,165 spaces for 1,500,000 square feet.

If you include the west side parking inventory, south to Newman Springs Road, the NJ Transit lot (available at night and weekends free of charge), The Galleria, The Two River Theater, proposed commercial and residential projects with parking, numerous private business off-street spaces and curb-side parking the inventory may well top 10,000-plus spaces or more.

Does Red Bank really have a parking problem?

The proposed garage will only add 300 additional spaces at a cost to tax payers of $40,000 per space. Claims that the garage will produce twelve fold the cost are ridiculous. If all 300 spaces produced $10 a day in revenue, 365 days per year, the annual income would be $1,095,000.

To produce a 12-fold benefit it would take approximately 100 years of full capacity operation to obtain the benefit.

I have been a resident of Red Bank for nine years and I have never, repeat never, had a problem parking in Red Bank on weekdays, week nights, weekends and holidays. Yes, perhaps I had to drive around a block or two to find a space but I always found one. Again I ask, what parking problem?

Red Bank is a finite town of 1.7 square miles with a 19th-century street plan. A survey of 80 Monmouth County towns shows Red Bank is the fifth most densely populated town with 6,724 residents per square mile.

No matter what some politicians may think or say the size of the town has not and will not increase no matter what they do. The 19th-century street plan is what it is, and was not designed to be a major shopping town/mall as envisioned by the mayor and his special interest supporters.

The Red Bank shopping district was originally designed in the 19th century to fill the needs of surrounding communities. It was not designed to draw customers from other counties, states, countries and continents.

An overwhelming majority of residents of Red Bank spoke loud and clear through the Town Council in 2001 concerning a pet project of the mayor, the building, at public expense, of an enormous parking garage. Their answer: No!

It seems this message is still being lost on some local politicos and members of RiverCenter. The new chairperson, in one of her first public announcements, proclaimed “We need a garage.”

When residents read statement like “We need a garage” after soundly defeating the last effort to build a parking garage, it only highlights the widening gap and disconnect between some business and residents.

Perhaps they could define the “We” they are talking about. Burdening and forcing the residents to build this garage, at an astronomical cost of 12 million for the supposed benefit of a few will be the swan song for the current town administration and an egregious failure to protect the public from footing the bill for a unnecessary garage.

Another informal survey of Red Bank businesses shows that many have there own parking lots and do not require public or on street parking.

In fact many businesses and nonprofits in Red Bank such as: Foodtown, Garmany, Professional Pharmacy, 7-Eleven, Riverview Medical Center, Wawa, Sovereign Bank, PNC Bank, Commerce Bank, Fleet Bank, Firestone, Teak Asian Fusion restaurant, Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley, Charles Schwab, Atlantic Glass, U.S. Post Office, Red Bank Town Hall, Meridian Nursing Home, Sun Bank, Beneficial Bank, Amboy National ,Victory Market, Monmouth Street Bike, Budget, Enterprise, Avis, The Red Bank Library, Jade Garden, NJ Transit, Visiting Nurse Assocation of Central New Jersey, Windward Deli, Molly Pitcher Inn, Oyster Point Hotel, The Antique Center, Penske, Kramer Photography, Verizon, City Centre Plaza, Welsh Farms, St. James Church, The Galleria, United Methodist Church, Broad Street, Atlantic Health Club, St. Anthony Church, Red Bank Liquors, the YMCA, The Salvation Army, Basil T’s, Childs Funeral Home, John E. Day Funeral Home, Thompson Memorial Home, Worden-Hoidal Funeral Homes, Brothers Restaurant and dozens and dozens of professional businesses too numerous to list that provide parking for employee and customers at there own expense.

If these businesses can afford to provide parking at there own expense, why not the “downtown” group that is clamoring and lobbying for a $12 million publicly paid for parking garage?

The residents and other businesses of Red Bank are not responsible for the profit margins of landlords or private businesses in “the downtown.”

Businesses that provide there own customer parking should not be penalized and have to subsidize their competitors. Providing customer parking should be a cost of doing business and not an expense burden placed on the backs of town taxpayers.

At the very least the town council should consider hiring an independent nonpartisan parking and traffic consultant to determine if a parking problem exists in Red Bank.

When asked about a ballot referendum so the residents of Red Bank could decide if they wanted to go into debt to the tune of $12 million for a garage the Mayor refused. I suspect he knows it would go down in defeat. A real mensch would have said OK.

James M. Corcoran is a resident of Red Bank