San Jose spent big bucks on parklets – but some businesses can’t afford to make them permanent

It’s a Thursday morning in the SOFA neighborhood of San Jose, California, and restaurant pop-up owner Brandon Salmon has served one of his very last Covid-era breakfast sandwiches.

The pop-up space is located in a parklet on South Second Street that was installed during the pandemic. But with San Jose — like most cities around the Bay Area — phasing out free parklet space for businesses, this one will soon be a relic of a time when masks and social distancing were part of our regular lexicon.

“These things have created hubs for the community,” Salmon, 29, said glumly. “People rely on these places to go. It just really bums me out.”

Over the last year, San Jose has started requiring business owners with pandemic-era parklet spaces to either pay up to keep their spot permanent or say goodbye to what some see as a vital asset that boosts local business and encourages people to walk in a city known for its car-centric character.

Salmon’s pop-up Hashndash is located in front of the cafe Academic Coffee; he shares the space with a group of other young entrepreneurs. But they’ll all have to take their business elsewhere after Academic Coffee’s owner decided the construction costs for building a permanent parklet were too pricey — even with a sizeable city grant.

The disappearance of the SOFA parklet that takes up about two parking spots closes the chapter on one of San Jose’s pandemic-era policies. In 2020, to help local businesses stay afloat when the county imposed strict rules on patronizing restaurants and cafes, the city relaxed its rules for outside dining and helped install the parklets.

But their sudden proliferation always had an end date, say city officials.

Nearly half a million dollars of pandemic-era federal funding helped pay for the installation and rental of the concrete barriers surrounding the parklets, according to Blage Zelalich from the city’s economic development office. Those funds have now dried up, leading

San Jose to shift the costs over to business owners. Of the 20 businesses that participated in the parklet program, 10 have applied for permanent spaces, according to city officials.

The city is currently offering a $35,000 grant to help businesses make the transition.

For Academic Coffee’s owner Frank Nguyen, the grant isn’t enough. The costs to build a permanent parklet is around $50,000 — including the hiring of an architect, as the city’s application requires detailed drawings and a site plan.

“I just don’t have that money to invest right now,” wrote Nguyen in a text message. “Even if I had any money, I need to prioritize our operational overhead to account for rising costs and cushion ourselves for anything unexpected.” He says he is unsure how the closure of the parklet will impact his coffee shop.

Nguyen’s business isn’t the only one that experienced sticker shock.

Andrew Espino, the owner of the art gallery 1Culture on East Santa Clara Street, shared a parklet last year with the cafe next door.

“We would put a DJ out there,” said Espino. “People could do live painting…

The point is, we were able to use that space in a positive way and create this really unique situation across from the City Hall. We were getting people from all over.”

But this spring, the city told Espino and the cafe owner next door that they would have to start covering the parklet’s barrier costs. Espino said neither he nor the cafe could cover what he estimated to be about $500 a month and the parklet was soon dismantled.

“We don’t have the money,” he said. “My business is a startup.

Things are tough. We don’t have the financial capability.”

Mayor Matt Mahan, who has made the economic health of local businesses one of his main priorities, said the real issue lies in building costs and that the grant already was a “large sum of money,” considering the historically tight budget.

“I think it’s a reflection of a broader challenge we face, which is the high cost of construction,” he said.

In October, a citycommissioned study found that construction prices in San Jose have spiked, with the report blaming high interest rates and exploding material costs.

Sitting at Academic Coffee’s parklet, local photographer Alex “Knowbody” arrived too late with his friends to nab a breakfast sandwich from Hashndash after the popup sold out of food. He said he’s torn about it eventually disappearing, noting that the other businesses in the SOFA neighborhood may now benefit from extra parking. But something will be lost, he said.

“It’s a vibe,” he said about the spot. “It’s like going to your homie’s house and he’s cooking.”