Should be replacing the old 50s motels with up to date PG Remodels instead.
Proposed ATC hotel won’t help
It’s always been about a certain quality of life in Pacific Grove. Always. It’s a bit slower, a bit quieter than our neighbors. If we need to see the “bright lights,” Monterey and Carmel are a very short drive away. I always loved the fact the sidewalks would roll up in the evenings and the town would go to sleep for another day. This quality of life is in danger of being taken away from us by people who want to make Pacific Grove into their vision of what Pacific Grove should be, a tourist town, a place for conventions, a place to hang out at night and have drinks.So why does Pacific Grove need another hotel? Most say we need the revenue. OK, what city doesn’t? The question we need to ask is, with a limited revenue source, what do we want to sacrifice in order to achieve a more sustainable revenue source? Raise taxes? Raise fees? Pacific Grove is not Monterey or Carmel and I’m not sure if we really want to or need to compete with them. These cities already have the infrastructure and are way ahead of us. If we add another hotel what will this do to the quality of life we have come to expect. With traffic, parking and water issues already at the forefront in town, how will another hotel help with these issues? Will these issues be lessened by building another hotel or will they become worse? Yes, a hotel will bring in revenue to the city but at what cost? Are we willing to throw out the baby with the bathwater? Are we going to accept that this is what’s required for Pacific Grove to become more of a tourist destination than it already is? My opinion is that Pacific Grove has always been a quiet little town and should stay this way. We should not sacrifice this quaintness in order to pay our infrastructure bills, pay for the retirement packages to city employees or to try to compete with our neighbors for tourist money.
Some have said that Pacific Grove needs a place for our school kids to have dances, a place for graduation ceremonies or even a place for high school reunions. My question is how many of these places does Pacific Grove require? We already have plenty of sites that can be used for civic events like Asilomar Conference Grounds, PG Performing Arts Center, the Masonic Lodge, Chautauqua Hall and the golf course clubhouse. There is a new boutique hotel going in at Central and Fountain that was presented to City Council as having space for local events so why do we require another hotel with another space for these events that can not seem to be accommodated currently?
At the proposed ATC hotel, there will be 304 valet served parking spaces for the 225 rooms but this number does not take into account the minimum of 75-100 employee parking spaces, plus vendor parking and all the parking spaces needed for special events will pretty much put the proposed allotted parking at more than capacity on most days.
It’s simple. It’s about our quality of life.
— Vicki Illgner, Pacific Grove
