Save Luther Burbank Park. No Park & Ride on park property.

My Kids love this park and having it turned into a parking is awful!

Because Sound transit is in a rush to complete parking for the South Bellevue Station and are in need of parking, they want to "help" build parking for off Islanders during this process. The time frame for public response and evaluation of environmental, traffic, safety and quality of life issues on the Island will be severly curtailed. The citizens of Mercer Island need to time to properly evaluate the impact. Turning Luther Burbank into a parking lot and 80th into a bus barn hardly seems good for Mercer Island.

Please protect our Island and our park.

Honor the LBP Master Plan

Save Luther Burban Park from development. Let's keep it a place to contemplate nature for generations to come.

The proposed parking structure is specifically designed to bring in more Eastside commuters to Mercer Island because Sound Transit needs a quick solution while they renovate Bellevue's Park and Ride. Please don’t let their temporary problem mean a permanent loss of park space and a chaotic atmosphere at the Community Center for us! A thorough and transparent exploration of how to increase access to the Park and Ride for MI residents should be conducted prior to this march towards the destruction of so much beautiful green space.

Three questions. First, has any though been given to expanding the current lot upwards a level or two? Second, why after 3 years will Islanders be relegated to the "offsite" lot rather than given priority in the nearby lot? Third, am I paying for the new lot to benefit off-Islanders? I'm concerned that for 3 years, there will be increased noise, pollution, wear-and-tear on existing roads, misfired car alarms, additional pressure on our community center bathrooms, additional trash, and other costs that the community will bear. We will lose grassy hills. Getting to the Community Center will be a headache. More long term, there's a substantial risk that the City will then find another use for the graded area. By way of example, look at the Mercerdale Community Pool, which became a Community Boys and Girls Club. Later, the pool was paved to become parking for a small Community Thrift Store, which is now open long hours, 6-days-a-week, in a residential neighborhood, and seeks to expand in size and volume. Neighbors enjoy noise, headlights, trash, loud trash dumpsters and beeping trucks, traffic, etc. from 5 am to closing. Recently, the City considered expanding the Thrift Shop Parking Lot to accommodate the throngs of off-Island visitors. Don't let this happen to another community.

I sent a response to Dan and other members of the City Council. It is copy-pasted here. ============================== Dan First and foremost I want to thank you and the other city councilors (Bruce, Tana, Debbie, Mike) on the to: line. Your service to the city is incredibly valuable. Thank you so much for your engagement and contributions. I’d like to share my views on the parking lot issue. A couple of things about me. I don’t live near the neighborhood in question where the proposed parking lot would go up if approved – i.e. I don’t live near or own any property near the community center. I am a member of the board of “Friends of Luther Burbank”. I have put some other board members on the thread although this email is entirely mine and does not reflect the view of “Friends” or the other board members necessarily. The first thing that jumps out to me about the proposal is that it reflects a very responsive and smart city council in action. You heard about parking needs. The Sound Transit folks had a need. The city has some land. So, why not bring it all together. Thank you for being so nimble. The thinking is creative, reflects a spirit of working with our neighboring communites and the proposal being made is a plausible one – it could happen and be OK. However, it still has the following negatives that make it far from the best solution: • It does not help our downtown district and its parking issues. It doesn’t help restaurants in that district for example. One of the topics in your newsletter below is about urban planning and making MI a great place. This proposal falls short in this regard in a big way. • It explicitly pulls in hundreds of cars from off island into the neighborhoods of MI for 6 years. We want to be good neighbors but if we can find a better transit solution that doesn’t involve this kind of traffic issue, why invite it? • It takes land that was intended for park purposes. What the land records say is irrelevant – we had hun

Deputy Mayor Grausz is spreading misinformation that the West Hill portion of the Community Center wasn't part of the LBP Master Plan and that the actual document approved by the City Council on April 17, 2006 was some series of "mistakes." The Grausz claim is ABSOLUTELY FALSE. I have three actual documents from 2006 that prove that including West Hill in the LBP Master Plan was knowing and purposeful. I don't know how to post the documents on this website; if you email me at [email protected], I will be happy to forward the documents to you. (1) The first document is the agenda bill (AB 4082), which is a description of the Luther Burbank Park Master Plan that was unanimously approved. The agenda bill specifically mentions West Hill as one of the six issue areas that the City Council discussed at the previous meeting on April 3, 2006. It concludes: "You concurred with the recommendations set forth by Mr. Michaelsen for each of the above areas..." West Hill improvements were specifically discussed and approved as part of the LBP Master Plan; it was no "oversight." (2)The second document is the Michaelsen memo (from the Berger Partnership) presented to the City Council at the previous, April 3rd council meeting. On page 3 of the memo at #5, the memo clearly describes the West Hill improvements and integration with LBP, which is an important part of the master plan. (3) The third document shows a rather detailed estimated costing of the West Hill improvements as part of the LBP Master Plan, which was presented at the April 17, 2006 council meeting where the LBP Master Plan was unanimously approved. The Grausz misinformation is based on a fundamental error -- his claim that the LBP Master Plan was limited to the property transferred to the City by King County. The Luther Burbank Park Master Plan, from the beginning, was seen to include LBP proper plus surrounding land that integrated the park with the City. That's how the consultants described t

I want to echo Bharat's comments of appreciation for Dan and other City Council Members. I am much thankful for all they do. If I had to point to one concern that I have about all the back and forth over a new parking area it is that to me we are discussing what type of broom we want to clean the kitchen with when we haven't even decided if we want to use a broom. I for one think we need to go back to the core problems that gave rise to the parking discussion and thoroughly consider whether another north end park and ride is even a good idea. The problems that initiated the discussion for expanded parking are a desire for better resident access to town center and regional transit service. This doesn't mean just access for those that happen to drive, but all our residents, young and old, ones that are handicapped and ones that don't own a car. Looking squarely at the needs, I think we can see that the solution under discussion doesn't work. It shouldn't be done. We shouldn't be discussing it. It is distracting us from real solutions. On the other hand, there are other ideas that should be considered. A good example is an island shuttle service. The idea here would be to have a shuttle bus transverse the island, end to end, stopping in each neighborhood as well as important island stops like our two shopping areas, our library, our schools, our community center and our town hall. It would be run continuously all day getting residents in a timely manner to our transit hub and other destinations. A shuttle service is not a new idea but one that has been successful in other communities. Unlike the parking idea, a shuttle has low impact on neighborhoods and pocketbooks. Whatever we decide though, we need to keep in mind that the solution has to be for everyone. The solution should not be just for the shops on the north end, but also the south end. The solution should give better access to all island facilities, not just one or two. The so