Downtown Spokane’s ‘parklet’ visitors can sit, dine on Main Avenue
A parklet appeared in front of Wollnick’s on Main Avenue in downtown Spokane on Thursday, turning heads and moving passers-by to call it “neat” or “awesome.”
But what is it?
“I don’t know, but it looks very inviting,” said Susan Angerman, who walked by the modular wooden patio perched in a loading zone with her son Trevor. “If I had more time I would stop and enjoy it.”
That much is clear. With a warmly colored varnish, a dozen seats, a few umbrellas and a chess set, the parklet is definitely for stopping and enjoying. The exact point of it, however, is what’s being tested in a 60-day pilot project recently approved by the city. The Downtown Spokane Partnership helped You Express Studio, which designed and built the parklet, navigate the city’s permit process. The DSP will contribute some funding to the project, which was paid for entirely by the studio and costs the city nothing but a lost loading zone spot.
The parklet, the work of José Barajas at You Express Studio, is basically a place to rest for pedestrians, more outdoor seating for Madeleine’s Cafe & Patisserie or a respite in the sun to confer with a phone.
Miles Bergsma, Wollnick’s store manager, said it was all that and more.
“There is an endless amount of concepts,” he said, noting that the parklet will transform into a stage Friday evening for an acoustic musician. He’s seen parklets in other towns act as pop-up coffee kiosks and a place for artists to hawk homemade goods.
But Bergsma sees the parklet as a way to “give back to the community” by providing something interesting to look at and to use.
“It makes this block more appealing to pedestrians. It’s human scaled,” he said, adding that he believed people would sit at the parklet and talk with people they normally wouldn’t. “We brought a human interaction to life that otherwise wouldn’t happen in a concrete jungle.”
For now, the parklet is the subject of curiosity.
“It’s drawn a lot of interest. Some people think it’s a social experiment,” Bergsma said, adding that people have examined it for hidden cameras. “The beer delivery guy showed up at 8 or 9 this morning with a WTF-look on his face.”
For Deb Green, who owns Madeleine’s with her daughter Megan Van Stone, it’s no mystery.
“I’ve seen these in Europe and thought they were the coolest idea,” she said. “It’s all about the continued urbanization of downtown. Giving up a parking space is completely worth it.”
Not everyone is on board with the parklet.
Alfredo LLamedo, a social worker and activist, is a regular at Spokane City Council meetings who decries the city’s so-called sit-lie ordinance, which makes it illegal to obstruct downtown sidewalks and is seen by some as targeting homeless people. When the council approved a resolution supporting the parklet on Monday, LLamedo testified that he would “occupy” the parklet in protest of the law, and welcomed any court action that followed.
Later in the week, he stood by his opposition to the law, but said he was looking for ways to balance the needs of business owners with the needs of homeless people.
“I’ve tried to make them understand this law is not applied to everybody equally,” LLamedo said, comparing the parklet to the most recent release of the iPhone, when people waited for hours in line, sitting on the sidewalk, but received no citation.
“If you go downtown and you’re dressed in a three-piece suit and you’re sitting on the planter on one end and there’s a kid with a backpack on the other end, he’s going to get chased away and you won’t,” he said. “That’s wrong. That’s profiling.”
Bergsma said he had spoken to LLamedo and was excited about a project they discussed: During the day it’s a parklet, but at night it transforms into a shelter for homeless people.
For now, the parklet will remain the source of questions from those who stroll by, and hopes are high that the experiment will work.
“I think the concept is awesome. It’s a nice place to people-watch,” said Timothy Kirby, who sat on the parklet in the morning. “I don’t know how long it will look as good it as does, with vandalism and all, but I hope it works out.”