Outside dining at Safeway - photos.

bad, bad Safeway

2010-02-01T14:51:00.001-08:00

In 2000, the Menlo Park City Council tasked Safeway and the local neighborhood to work together to come up with a plan for a new store at Middle Avenue and El Camino Real. The Safeway Working Group was formed; a member since its inception, I penned a way of working together to address concerns and issues with complete resolution in order to move the project forward (which served, in part, as inspiration for my Series on Success Cross-Functional Team Leadership.)

Working Group members spent countless hours over the last 10 years in Working Group, Sub-group, Neighborhood, and City meetings, to come up with a successful project as endorsed by us to the City Council in 2005. And hundreds, if not thousands of additional hours in addressing issues in the demolition, Conditions of Development, construction, and operational issues of the new store including; noise, parking, flooding, trash, pedestrian and bike access, aggressive panhandling, landscaping, security, and yes even the Menlo Park Safeway employee arrested in a sting operation selling methamphetamine to undercover police officers in the parking lot.

As you may have heard or read, I appealed a new use permit for Safeway that would effectively increase the square footage of the retail stores by hundreds of square feet, on grounds that they have not complied with their own Conditions of Development (CoD) in the following areas:

    * Safeway Van Parking. The City Planner negated the CoD by allowing Safeway to park the Safeway.com delivery vans in customer parking - the CoD calls for them to be parked there limited hours. The City Planner should not change the CoD regarding parking until all the retail space is full for a holiday period, to understand potential impacts before changing CoD.
    * On-site Banking: CoD calls for on-site banking, currently there is only an ATM machine and the ability for employees to cash paychecks at the service desk.
    * Safeway is two years in arrears on Transportation Demand Management Program reporting, and the current plan they submitted (Dec. '09) has no checks and balances, or employee surveys attached.
    * CEQA Exemption. California Environmental Quality Act. Sometime in 2007 Safeway slipped in CEQA exemption into the project. This is simply unacceptable and should be revoked.
    * In addition I would like to see the addition of a "smoking area" and have all the store fronts be non-smoking.

As you all know, I support outdoor seating for both Peet's and Rubio's. And, while the above has little to do with outdoor seating, this is a last-ditch effort to hold Safeway responsible for the promises they broke since we endorsed the project in in 2005.

http://safewayphotos.blogspot.com/
http://moresafewayphotos.blogspot.com/

2009-10-19T18:15:00.000-07:00

More Safeway Photos -

2009-08-30T21:29:00.000-07:00

More photos click here:

http://moresafewayphotos.blogspot.com/

Coffee, Tacos, Meth?

2009-08-18T10:58:00.000-07:00

Let me first say, that I am in support of outdoor seating/dining at 525 El Camino! These photos highlight some of my comments / concerns about the Safeway, Rubio's, and Peet's development. We wanted nice retail and we got a strip mall. Letter to Planning below.

Scroll down to see all photos, CLICK on any picture to ENLARGE!

Please note landscaping has taken place of the metal bar in front of the Left Bank outdoor seating area.

New landscaping at outdoor dining area at Cooks Seafood 751 El Camino.

Starbucks landscaping, garbage bin w/ashtray 863 El Camino

Safeway store tables and landscaping.
Rubio's and Peet's. Sidewalks, doorways, bins, are filthy. This landscaping would be removed to make way for sidewalk to make way for seating.

Peet's - the fire and gas lines on the parking lot side will be moved (here?) to make room for seating. Too industrial already...

Note: lack of cart storage/shagging and the pipelines that will have to be moved.

For your dining pleasure - ashtrays are big as garbage cans... attractive!

Customer parking - hummm.

Assistant Manager asking solicitors to leave - they refused for the better part of 25 minutes... I did not feel safe enough to walk home.

Letter to Planning followed by letter to Safeway Working Group
Hi Thomas,

Thank you for your time on the phone today. I greatly appreciate your time explaining the "action" and "appeal" of the notice regarding the seating.

My major concerns are as follows:
1. Neither I, nor my immediate neighbors at Middle received the notification from the city. Blame it on USPS? It would be my preference to have the notification sent to the larger mailing list as was done for the main store.

2. I believe the railing around the Rubio's patio should be re-thought taking into consideration several things.
For example, a reduction in number of tables, keeping and improving the current landscaping, location of trash and ashtray bins, and the awkward bump-out of the railing around the tables. The railing in front of the Left Bank tables has been removed. The landscaping that is currently in front of Rubio's is quite dissimilar to the landscaping in front of the tables in front of the Safeway store.

3. Regarding Peet's, I object to the removal of the landscaping and wonder where all the carts will end up that are now in that passage area. In addition this is a fire lane and with the gas and electric lines on Middle it looks very 'machine room' already.

4. Parking. Last Tuesday afternoon, I counted 11 employees at Rubio's, add to that people saying longer sitting outside at Rubios and Peet's, in addition to the 40 foot container blocking two rows of parking in the middle of the parking lot and the Safeway.com delivery vans taking up 5 permanent spaces on the El Camino facing side of the parking lot. In other words, the parking lot and the Middle Avenue drive way are already a mess. What happens when you add more seating and alcohol to that mix?

5. I am seriously concerned about loitering in the parking lot area. I hope that the outdoor seating will cut down on the nefarious activities taking place in the parking lot, including; gang activity, drug dealing, illegal solicitation, and loitering on private property.

Letter to Working Group
IMHO we 'approved' seating at Peet's and Rubio's before the shops were even built out. Based on the 5 reasons listed below, I urge you all to look at the area, including traffic patterns on Middle, and share your thoughts. As you all know, I support outdoor seating and alcohol being served, but wonder if we could do better (al la Left Bank, Cafe Baronne.) Thomas Rogers at Planning has been very helpful.

Was snapping photos of the landscaping in front of the store vs. landscaping in front of Rubio's and noticed three illegal solicitors asking for 'cash donations.' I was happy to see the Asst. Manager come out - on his own accord - to ask the men to leave. After taking pictures around Rubio's, I noticed the solicitors had not left, so I went back to Safeway and asked for Stan (who refused to come down until the Asst. Mgr. later called him.) I pointed out to the Asst. Mgr. that there was one at the other door, he again asked them to leave. They became angry and irate with us and would not leave the parking lot. These guys watched me and the manager from their car for 20 minutes before leaving. Since I had walked to the store, I felt threatened and unsafe to walk home, the store offered me a ride, but a neighbor came to the rescue. If I had my cell phone I would have called the police, I had asked Mgmt. to do so, and they did NOT. Oh, while I waited out front for the guys to leave, we saw one meth-head with a pit bull, two other potential methheads casing the parking lot.

This clear gang activity, coupled with the recent drug dealing arrest, makes me wonder why Safeway no longer has a security guard on duty. There is 'turf war' potential, and I fear gang activity will increase.

For your information the 40' container in the middle of the parking lot is for a liquor/bread aisle remake - less bread more liquor - and should be complete before Labor Day weekend.

Best to all,
Elizabeth
PS. Again, click on any link for photos, click on any photo to enlarge in a new window.