Narratives over Needs

Beach parking for 600...comfort not guaranteed

Yesterday, the BOCC had a newly-scheduled work session in the morning. While it was geared toward discussion of four future parking garages, the scheduling was clearly aimed at starting the process on the potential Holmes Beach parking structure. Up until now, it’s only been mentioned in passing and no direction has been set for staff since HB 947 became law on July 1, 2023 allowing for a parking structure on county-owned land.

Below is the work session video, starting at the beginning of the beach parking discussion, which runs through the end of the meeting.

We’ve heard many reasons why the Holmes Beach parking garage should not be built. The means in which our County’s rights have superseded a local municipality is an attack on home rule allowing cities to determine their own land use rights. It’s seen as big government strong-arming a process. The structure would be an eyesore at the entrance to Anna Maria Island. The parking would cause environmental issues. The current concession area is historic and needs to remain. All of these and many more have been brought to our attention.

These are all subjective concerns. Not that they’re without merit, but they’re essentially opinion-based. I have kept an open mind to this idea throughout the process pending real information. As I saw it yesterday, there are two primary reasons why the BOCC needs to slow down this process, which is now moving forward and spending your taxes on planning and design work.

The first reason is simply the opportunity cost of the garage versus other needed projects.

We spend a considerable amount of time assessing our Capital Improvement Plan (County website for CIP) to ensure we’re focusing your tax dollars on those projects that make the most sense in order to improve the collective quality of life of everyone. That philosophy should be the primary question for all capital improvement and budget discussions in government.

What is the margin value to the tax payer for every dollar spent?

Manatee County is admittedly well behind on our infrastructure and, with 10,000+ new residents moving in every year, we’re not catching up fast. We have a finite amount of capital to spend and we need to ensure we’re providing the most return for the most tax payers with every one of those dollars. Right now, we have numerous major roadway, bridge and local infrastructure projects that are awaiting funding.

The BOCC has went to both Tallahassee and Washington DC declaring the expansion of the Fort Hamer Bridge “our number one priority”. That additional two-lane bridge is estimated to cost $60MM. The current bridge has an average traffic count of 21,000 vehicles per day. Many of which sit idling in heavy traffic awaiting those new lanes to substantially improve their commute and their quality of life.

Manatee County is also working to finalize the decades-long 44th Avenue project which was proposed as the primary east-west thoroughfare reliever for SR 64 and SR 70. Just last week we met on the bridge over Braden River for a ribbon cutting to finalize Segment #5. All that’s left between having the current dead-ends on either side of I-75 and having a complete, continuous road between Lakewood Ranch and the Island is Segment #6 and its Interstate flyover. Unfortunately, that is presently $50MM over budget. Those funds need to be found to improve the daily congestion tens of thousands of residents experience each and every day.

Without even diving into the entire CIP budget, and simply looking at the shortfall in other parking garages (most importantly the $100MM for the downtown garage due to the imminent need), the Ft. Hamer Bridge and 44th Avenue, we’re looking at over $200MM in capital needs. This exceeds our county’s remaining bonding capacity.

When looking objectively at which projects to focus our attention, its clear that we’d create substantially more collective good with your dollars elsewhere. A small parking garage, only needed a handful of times a year, would benefit less people over the entire year than the Ft. Hamer Bridge expansion would benefit in a DAY.

These are your dollars. I need to ensure we’re focusing them on our actual needs, not simply narratives.

The second reason is that, honestly, this parking garage will make absolutely no difference.

There is only so much capacity on a narrow island. You can build a 10,000 car garage and it simply won’t make a difference. The Causeway and narrow island roads are bottlenecks for access to the Island to get to that parking. The shallow beach, especially during high tide, limits the number of people that can be comfortably on the sand at any time. The restaurants, bars and entertainment options are already overcrowded, with long waits today.

We can force our way into more parking but we can’t pull any strings to create more beach, wider roadways or larger restaurants. We’re facilitating getting more people onto an island just to make everyone a little more cramped and uncomfortable once they get there.

All of this is probably not a major issue since the parking garage is seemingly getting smaller. What was stated as 1,500 spots previously is now reflected as 900 spots. This is even less meaningful when you consider that it’s proposed to be built on the existing parking lot (which actually has over 400 spots but the presentation said 300, so I’ll use that lower number to avoid argument). That’s a net increase of only 600 parking spaces…for between $30MM and $50MM of your tax dollars.

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AMI is not short on parking for +/350 days a year either. Other than spring break, Memorial Day, July 4th and maybe a handful of other days, you can always find parking. There are three cities on AMI with available parking. Below are just the public spots in Holmes Beach.

Are there days and times when all parking is full? Let’s assume for discussion that there are. The reality, however, is that it’s to be expected. We can’t build everything to maximum capacity for peak days. That’s inefficient and a poor use of your tax dollars. We can’t build enough boat trailer parking for Memorial Day. We can’t build enough pickleball courts for everyone to play on a Saturday morning. And we cannot build enough Island parking to get everyone onto the beach in their own car on a summer holiday. That’s just a fact.

Does that mean you don’t have access to the beach as some would imply? Of course not. There are 364 other days to enjoy the beach. There are also other means to get to AMI. We have the Beach Express (Route 3) bus service that requires no parking space. We are imminently launching our new Water Taxi service. You can also carpool to avoid parking issues. No one is preventing you from the full enjoyment of, and access to, our beautiful beaches.

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Right now, the implication is that we need to spend whatever it costs to get a few more cars on Anna Maria Island “because we need to provide unimpeded access to beaches for all”. In reality, 600 spots will solve nothing and will be very painful for two years while under construction - and for much longer as we pay it off while ignoring more universally-beneficial infrastructure projects.

As I asked in the meeting, after these 600 people are taken care of for $30MM+, what is this board going to say to the 601st resident to come across that bridge and demand their rights to parking? Where is the next garage going to be built? And the one after that? At what point do we concede the reality of the situation and focus our attention on real, long-term solutions?

We need to be spending our time working on solutions like a third, transit-only lane on the new bridge to AMI to allow for more efficient landside parking options. We need to work with the municipalities to get the water taxi up and running as a viable option. We need to work on parking efficiencies to avoid traffic endlessly circling for spaces (Holmes Beach is working on tech-based systems to reflect available spaces in real-time, which could be expanded to the rest of the Island). We need to get the word out that there are 365 days in the year and the most popular days are not necessarily the most enjoyable days on an island already exceeding its capacity due to the immense popularity of AMI.

Wouldn’t a fiscally-sound plan be to at least see how these alternative solutions, and the hundreds of new spaces secured by the City of Holmes Beach in the past few months, help alleviate parking strains before we reallocate tens of millions of dollars to the least cost-effective, most-disruptive solution?

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This parking garage has its merits. But it also has its flaws. We have seemingly lost focus of the fact that this Board is elected to have a fiduciary responsibility to spend your tax dollars wisely to maximize your quality of life. The focus now seems to be less on the community’s collective needs and more on the narrative that can be told, through board actions, that increasing go directly against those needs.

This parking garage has less to do with the actual access it will provide you and more to do with all the times you’ll be reminded of who got you that access.

Just don’t ask what you traded, in infrastructure or comfort, for those few extra spots.

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