Good morning City Council Members,
I appose the conversion of downtown parking lots to housing. This will be the death of downtown businesses and create a multi-year migration of business and shoppers away from Menlo Park to Stanford, Palo Alto and Redwood City, all cities who understand the mutual benefits of retail-restaurant-parking relationship and how online shopping is killing small and medium businesses. By proceeding down this parking lot to housing path, downtown will become a construction zone with no thriving business for the entire construction time frame and for years to follow. This parking lot to housing area will become a place of exodus for all retailers and a financial disaster for all property owners. Renting office/retail space will become impossible all due to your inability to properly plan a housing project that provides a blend of community improvement and business owner support.
Rethink your idea and prepare a better option for the Menlo Park community, business owners, restaurants and retail stores, the shoppers and diners.
Randy Raphael
Business Owner and Local Shopper/Diner
rraphael@value.net
