A little background. In most cities and counties, the streets are NOT owned by the municipalities. Cities and counties rarely buy the underlying property, what they have instead is a public easement. The easement is given for the good of the public and it is illegal to block it without permission. If you own your home you can look at your deed and will see that your property extends to the middle of the street and you have an easement on that part (that means you cannot prevent people from being on the street).
A few months back there was an article on a Southern California paper discussing how the City was considering putting mini-parks on platforms taking away parking spaces. Today, I saw a piece on San Jose doing a similar thing. I will include a link at the end. Here is the thing, if San Jose allows restaurants to utilize these spots, they will be constructively partially vacating the easement. If their little trial does not work out, they could end up permanently losing that part of the street for public use.
There is an attack being aimed at driving. Throughout the nation, bike lanes and encroachments into the right of ways are restricting traffic and at the same time, cities and counties are increasing parking fees and fines.
Yahoo - San Jose Considers SF-Style 'Parklets' For Outdoor Dining
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment