By Beth Annon Lovering
Owning a small business in Davis isn’t always easy. My lease, payroll, taxes, and other expenses all add up, and we have to work around the ebb and flow of the UCD schedule when students disappear in summer and during breaks. And there are weekdays where the foot traffic is light. For businesses like mine, new customers close to downtown could make all the difference in the world.
I’ll be voting yes on Measure A, because it is good for Davis and good for downtown especially. In my experience, most of the customers for my business are Davis residents. We get and welcome customers from all over the region, but what sustains my business are our neighbors.
The Nishi Gateway includes 650 new housing units for students, seniors, and young professionals, and there will be hundreds of new workers at the R&D spaces. Those people will be my neighbors – people who live and work within walking and biking distance of my business.
The promotion of a vibrant downtown is a proven economic development strategy and strengthens our community. Cities across the nation are investing in their core areas where people want to live and work. Nishi offers a unique chance to support our downtown and Davis values. That’s why it has been identified as the top economic development priority by city leaders. The Davis Downtown is the hub of our community for jobs, innovation and a place we all come together. Measure A will help strengthen the downtown core area.
I appreciate that the developers are designing Nishi to encourage people to leave the car behind. Davis does a great job cultivating a biking culture, and anecdotally, I find that our city’s most avid bicyclists are people who enthusiastically patronize local businesses.
Given its ideal location directly between UC Davis and downtown, Measure A goes to great lengths to promote bicycling, including hundreds of bike parking spots and miles of new bike paths, and dedicated bike lanes. Most important, Measure A creates a separated biking path along the Richards Boulevard, protecting bicyclists from vehicles. This separation puts an end to the dangerous weave conditions where I-80 meets Richards. Folks living and working at Nishi can patronize downtown without driving there.
It’s estimated that the Nishi Gateway will produce $385 million in economic activity and 1,500 jobs, much focused downtown. Nishi will also provide our city with $1.4 million of revenue every year, raising about as much money as our city’s parcel tax. It does all this without any new taxes.
If Measure A fails, Davis will miss a tremendous opportunity. 1,500 fewer jobs will be created. The city’s financial picture will deteriorate, and we’ll lose this rare chance to upgrade street conditions and access to downtown. Davis is a great place, but we can’t ignore the critical needs of our city. When we are given the choice to help our locally-owned businesses or to hurt them, to give people job opportunities or to lose them, the choice is obvious to me. I encourage supporters of our downtown to vote yes on Measure A.
Beth Annon Lovering is the Owner of B&L Bike Shop
This points out another consideration that gets scant attention… the need for paying customers downtown.
The main conflict with Measure A and Nishi appears to be from residents of the core area and near core area. These folks feel pretty good about their circumstances: they get to live a suburban lifestyle (single-family-style homes with yards) next to the main commercial hub of the city.
I understand their concerns… their feeling that they are losing this advantageous position of owning or renting in the core area and near core area… that the traffic and scope and scale of the area is going to increase and wipe away some of what they value about living where they live.
But recently we had a murder at one of the restaurants downtown that converts to a nightclub. The reason many of the restaurants add the nightclub business is that they don’t have enough paying customers during normal business hours to make their business cash flow just providing regular food and beverage service. The density of the residential element in the core and near core areas is not enough to provide the needed customer base. It is exacerbated by the fact that the residents of the core and near core area are gray and graying… moving toward the older demographic that tend to spend less money dining out.
The bottoms line here is that the core and near-core area residents are really dammed if they do and dammed if they don’t. If they manage to defeat Measure A, they will see the downtown continue to change into an entertainment zone for students… and thereby reducing its value to the core and near core area residents. If Measure A passes, the downtown becomes more vibrant and full-service, but the traffic and population density will increase… and the later also tends to reduce the perception of value for the core and near-core residents.
The perspective I have is that Nishi is good for the city and good for the majority of the residents. Given the trade-offs, if I was a resident of the core or near-core area, I would make the moral decision to support Measure A and look forward to more value in downtown business.
“If Measure A fails, Davis will miss a tremendous opportunity. 1,500 fewer jobs will be created. The city’s financial picture will deteriorate, and we’ll lose this rare chance to upgrade street conditions and access to downtown. Davis is a great place, but we can’t ignore the critical needs of our city. When we are given the choice to help our locally-owned businesses or to hurt them, to give people job opportunities or to lose them, the choice is obvious to me. I encourage supporters of our downtown to vote yes on Measure A.”
Well said!
Nishi will be horrible for the downtown. Where are all those huge numbers of new cars going to drive? Where will they park? I strongly believe that FEWER customers will come downtown, than more. I have lived and worked and owned property in the core area since 1995.
Mike, serious question … how will Nishi contribute new cars to downtown?
I don’t think you get it Mike. More customers would already be downtown within walking distance of downtown. Why would anyone living at or working at Nishi drive 1 block to downtown and then try to find a place to park?
Nishi is the best solution for adding customers to downtown without adding traffic.
Now if we include housing at MRIC, then we would expect more traffic downtown.