The many uses for the Granada Garage

BY LORETTA REDD
Knock, knock…
Who’s there?
No one…except maybe, two bicycles and seven automobiles located in the cavernous confines of the Granada Garage on this particular Sunday. While Santa Barbara’s own Taj Mahal to the automobile sits almost empty, patrons continue to use the lot adjacent to the library, and other city parking facilities.
I guess $19,100,000 just doesn’t buy what it used to today, whether it’s funded from Series 2001 A bond proceeds or directly out of our pockets.

In true Santa Barbara fashion, finding the over-studied and overblown design still lacking, Council voted during construction to expend an additional $420,000 to raise the ceiling height on the subterranean floors by one foot, so it wouldn’t ‘feel so ominous.’ C’mon people, it’s a basement.
That was followed by the discovery of what a difference two feet really could make, especially when measuring the width of Anacapa Street. The error necessitated study after study, plus input from four advisory boards regarding options for auto ingress and egress. Parallel parking in front of the County building was eliminated, and a short but garish partial turn lane appeared. The conclusion was, “90 percent of the time only one car will be waiting to enter the garage requiring no cars to be queued within the structure.”
I’m sorry, but if 90% of the time there’s only one car waiting, how necessary can this opulent and underutilized 575 space garage be? To be fair, I am thrilled to report that during Fiesta this year, the garage occupancy reached 85% occupancy on one occasion, and I assume they weren’t counting the horses.
It is a garage with its own website. It is a garage with a public service counter staffed by city employees, it has semi-attached low income housing, common trash and recycling for local businesses, and a rather grand stairwell. But could there be other uses for the garage while tourists and residents warm to its existence?
For instance, as healthy alternatives to gang activities, the empty floors could be made into a second skateboard park, with high speed ramp way jumps. Or if skateboarding isn’t your thing, we could steal an idea from Goleta and turn it into an ice skating rink. ‘Snoopy on Ice,’ and with Zamboni races in the garage, it could be quite a draw.
Since the city is on a mission about mixed use environmentally friendly projects, how about we embellish on the recent design for the Chapala Street transit center and build a day care and dog kennel combo on an upper floor, with energy generating wind towers, as long as playing fetch or soccer doesn’t send someone’s darling sailing over the edge.
Here’s a money maker… start with a wine tasting center on the top floor, and have the cops set up a breathalyzer test at the exit gate. If you blow too high a number, there would be a Starbucks sobering center on the same floor.
Other ideas might include a roof-top drive in movie theatre with the big screen projected on the back of the Granada Tower office-condos. Or a pricey RV parking center…I can see the Good Sam Club flag flying high with a tourist center, bicycle repair, coffee cafe, and other amenities right on site. Better yet, how about dedicating the two basement floors to a Target store, for those housewives burning precious petroleum products to get to their outlet malls in Ventura.
Ironically, I believe one reason the garage is underutilized is because, well, it just doesn’t look like a garage. At the cost of almost twenty million dollars, surely there are some uses for this edifice other than sitting empty awaiting the Granada Theater’s occasional evening performances, or the once a year Fiesta parade. I’d love to hear your ideas.
Knock, knock…who’s there?
Hopefully, not the same group who’ll be in charge of approving the downtown transit center!