What is more important: Parking or being able to walk to stores?

[farmall806]

Hi.

With parking spaces being hard to find, what is more important in a small town? Parking spaces or having a town set up so that the businesses are within walking distance to residential areas?

farmall806

[therising]

Both are important.

Nearby housing is important for Mom and Pop retailers. At the same time, most of the Villages in this area don't have the population to support a majority of businesses, so you need adequate parking as well.

Put Vidler's (or any other retailer) in Greenwich Village and parking would become a non-issue.

[stevenco]

This nation is obese. They should accomodate those who walk, more. Pedestrain routes should be more of a priority. When I was in Germany, they were making fun of how American's don't even want to get out of their car (drive thrus) to eat.

[speaker]

Parking is more important to downtown Buffalo. This is the old story of the malls getting all the business. So parking is important. I found out that to buy something downtown cost more because of the cost of parking thrown in. And usually the people who are able to walk to downtown are poor and don't bring in revenue. That's why it would be ideal to get middle and higher income individuals to reside there. But Buffalo has to be made safe for pedestrians--and this is a biggie. It doesn't help to cut the police force.

[gubmentcheez]

Parking is just as important to small towns. If you want to see the difference, go to Arcade....their problem is amplified by the fact that RT39 is a four-lane truck-magnet through downtown, but on one whole side of the street there's no parking, and it shows.

If you take a drive through East Aurora and then go to Arcade, you'll see ten or twelve stores in Arcade for rent - cheap. They can't keep businesses, and it's because they have no parking on main street (little parking, I should say).

All the businesses west of town are where it's active.

That, and the fact that the truck traffic make Arcade dirty. There's quite a difference between two villages only 20 miles apart. Anybody wants to open a resturant or retail store - I know where you can get one or two or threeREAL CHEAP.

[granpabob]

resturant twenty, seats hardware one aisle groceries bread milk cereal, the only way to attract enough people to support yourself and the store is to have parking. walk in traffic is nice but -you are competing with the big boys so you have to have low prices or enough items to compete. Notice service quality etc are not mentioned thats because price parking and one stop shopping are very important. If your village can provide everything Walmart has at walmart prices it might survive Facts are Fact as much as I like small business when I purchase something for my business I have to justify the cost. Walmart and Home Depot are the price setters now. for me to justify a purchase you have to be within a few cents of these two giants. Saws at small hardware stores can be fifty to a hundred dollars more exspensive then Home Depot I have to save the money or lose my job. to offer these prices you need volume. volume means parking.