Gilchrist residents take matters into their own hands

A number of Gilchrist Avenue residents have formed a group  to fund parking and landscaping on the Gilchrist Avenue medial, according to Lynne Seibert, chairman of the Boca Grande Community Panel.

The group was created after Lee County officials told the panel they were not willing to pay for the project at this time.

“I don’t know who is involved in the group, but I know they looked into matching funds,” Seibert said. “They’re not far enough along to act on it at this point, and I doubt if they will be there at May 13 meeting. There are people that were supposed to be working on it, but most of them are gone up North now.”

At the February meeting of the Boca Grande Community Panel, one of the proposals made by audience members and former panel chairman Bayne Stevenson was to establish a “Friends of Gilchrist” group which would procure funds that the panel hoped the county might match.

Tom Smith, the panel’s consultant, agreed with the suggestion at the time.

“If the community comes out and says we really want to support some sort of landscaping on Gilchrist, maybe matching funds would be the way to proceed,” he said at the February meeting.

According to Seibert, some residents took that suggestion to heart. However, when the group obtained the paperwork needed to apply for matching funds they realized they were in for more than they bargained for.

“When they went to look into it they found that the forms were pretty elaborate and were very lengthy,” Seibert said.

Gilchrist Avenue residents who have attended community panel meetings in the past have spoken up in reference to many different matters, including church and construction vehicle parking, landscaping and the possibility of putting in marked parking spaces.

Gilchrist Avenue has been a hot topic of discussion since the panel’s landscaping consultant, Rick Lamb, presented the panel and community with an option that included small groupings of parking spots and native vegetation on the medial.

Under Lamb’s first proposal, Gilchrist Avenue would have a narrow sidewalk on one side, incorporate low landscaping for the street and medial, and completely eliminate medial parking. The second option presented was to incorporate head-in or angled parking spaces along Gilchrist’s medial, but only between 5th and 3rd Street. The parking spaces would be grouped in pods of five or six and would be associated with the avenue’s residences, three churches and the Gasparilla Inn Beach Club. Under this plan, Gilchrist would have enough parking for about 35 vehicles.

Both options would significantly reduce the number of parking spaces available to residents, guests, visitors, and employees or contractors working near the downtown area.

Residents, business owners and panel members have spoken out against Lamb’s proposals at several meetings, and have said that banning or severely restricting medial parking on Gilchrist would hurt local businesses and the employees who serve the community.

The panel’s community feedback survey that was done in May of 2004 asked one question directly pertaining to Gilchrist Avenue parking, and was worded as to whether or not parking in the median should be restricted to church functions only. Out of 518 people who responded, 229 people agreed, 67 remained neutral and 222 disagreed.

Residents have complained that church parking on the Gilchrist medial on the weekends is overwhelming, and while local businesses such as Englewood Bank have given permission for church patrons to park in their lots, Gilchrist residents are saying that everyone still parks the medial.