Conflict eases as merchants, council meet

Princeton Borough announces the creation of an e-mail list and Web site to update merchants on construction.

By: Jennifer Potash
   Putting these two groups in the same room with each other — downtown merchants concerned about downtown construction projects and the Princeton Borough Council, having faced months of angry complaints over the construction — may be a volatile mix.
   But surprisingly, the two groups held a productive discussion Tuesday at Borough Hall with the council announcing the creation of an e-mail list and Web site to inform merchants of construction updates and the merchants promising to contact the borough as soon as problems arise from the downtown construction.
   "Keep up the good work," Mayor Marvin Reed said at the end of the discussion attended by about 50 merchants.
   The meeting was prompted by a suggestion from the Borough Merchants for Princeton after many downtown retailers voiced concern about how the downtown will cope with two major construction project, the Princeton Public Library and the Spring Street garage, under way simultaneously in 2003.
   Borough Merchants is a volunteer organization of businesses and has about 70 members.
   Mayor Reed said the borough has reconfigured some short-term meters on Witherspoon Street to longer 10-hour meters and done the same for the meters in the Trinity Church lot off Mercer Street. The mayor said it might be possible to include employers that do not currently pay for employee parking in a shuttle system set up for construction workers for the library and parking garage projects.
   "We want to do what we can to mitigate the effect on you," Mayor Reed said.
   One of the loudest complaints from the merchants was what they said is aggressive enforcement by parking meter officers. Some merchants said some customers had pledged never to shop in Princeton again after returning to find a parking ticket on their windshield.
   Karen Del Rossi, who opened her golf and resort clothing store, Paradise Found, on Nassau Street two months ago, said she found the meter officers very unsympathetic.
   "I watched (a meter officer) give a ticket at 6:30 p.m. on Christmas Eve in the snow and in front of a church," she said. "That didn’t seem very compassionate."
   Torben Huge-Jensen, owner of Bowhe & Peare gift store in Palmer Square, said merchants have received parking tickets for unloading merchandise from their vehicles in a permitting loading zone. He said a meter officer watched him unload and instead of asking him how long he would be there, wrote him a ticket for staying too long in the zone.
   Leo Arons, owner of the Gilded Lion antique shop on Chambers Street, said the perception of Princeton as hostile to shoppers stems from the attitude of enforcement officers.
   "I received a parking ticket in Lambertville and the meter officer actually apologized to me," Mr. Arons said. "And I still go back to Lambertville."
   Princeton Borough Police Chief Charles Davall, who attended the session, said officers are instructed to allow merchants or delivery services a reasonable amount of time to unload their merchandise, up to an hour, but many independent merchants have no identification on the vehicles, he said.
   Councilwoman Wendy Benchley urged the police to adopt a kinder and gentler approach to meter and loading zone violations during the construction period.
   Joanne Farrugia, owner of Jazams, a toy store on Hulfish Street, suggested the merchants use an identification card in their car window so the police will know their vehicle is properly parked in the loading zone.
   Mr. Howard said the Borough Merchants could make and distribute the cards. Chief Davall said the cards would be sufficient for his officers to distinguish a merchant unloading stock versus a downtown visitor looking for a convenient place to park.
   Some merchants also sought to counter a view held by other retailers that there is a parking problem downtown.
   "There is a perception we have a problem, but there are lots of places to park," said Bill Howard, owner of Triangle Repro copy center on Nassau Street and vice president of the Borough Merchants.
   Henry Landau, co-owner of Landau’s on Nassau Street, and one of the plaintiffs in Concerned Citizens of Princeton’s lawsuit against the borough’s garage development, said the availability of the Princeton University parking lots to customers on weeknights and weekends was a great help.
   Councilman David Goldfarb suggested the merchants support a Special Improvement District, or SID, which through a special assessment on all merchants and restaurants, could promote the downtown shops. A SID, Mr. Goldfarb said, would be governed by a board of directors almost entirely comprised of merchants and business owners.
   "It would give you a voice to the governing body and for your clientele," Mr. Goldfarb said.
   Both contracts for the library construction and borough’s garage project require the workers to park their vehicles outside the borough and take a shuttle system to the project site, Mayor Reed said.
   Karen Child, a Witherspoon Bread Co. employee complained about construction workers parked next to the concrete barriers on Witherspoon Street sitting on pickup truck tailgates eating meals purchased from a lunch truck parked near the bakery located across the street from the library construction site.
   "It’s a real slap in the face," Ms. Child said.
   Mayor Reed said the merchants and the council would meet again in a few months.