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Commuter parking lot closes after Oct. 16 Date published: 10/10/2009
By KELLY HANNON Commuters who meet their carpool or vanpool at Walmart in Stafford's Washington Square Plaza on State Route 3 will have to find a new place to park after next Friday. The Ferry Farm-area Walmart is undergoing a transformation from a standard store to a Walmart Supercenter, which will include a grocery store. Walmart expects the Supercenter to attract additional customers during the day Mondays through Fridays, and more customer parking will be needed in the shopping center at those times, said Walmart spokeswoman Ashley Hardie. Consequently, Walmart can no longer allow commuter parking in its lot after Oct. 16, she said. Until now, about 100 commuters have parked in a sparsely used corner of the lot far from the store entrance. It is a popular meeting place for carpools and vanpools destined for the Dahlgren area of King George. "It's very convenient for those of us who live in the city or south Stafford," said Rodney Shook of Fredericksburg, who has met a vanpool in the Walmart lot for three years. "At this point, my only alternative is to drive five miles west of the city to the Gordon Road lot. So that's like adding 10 miles to my round trip just to get to the vanpool, whereas it's not out of my way at all to use the Walmart lot." He thought Walmart allowed commuter parking as part of a good-neighbor policy, he said. "We're getting such short notice on this," Shook said. "We're scrambling." The loss of the lot is another setback to commuter parking in the Fredericksburg area. With the temporary suspension of the High Occupancy Toll lane project on Interstate 95, which could have funded thousands of new commuter parking spaces in the Fredericksburg area, there are no active construction plans for new lots under way. Walmart's tolerance for commuter parking was rare. Although a few shopping centers in the Fredericksburg area allow free, informal commuter parking, most do not. The decision to let commuters park in a shopping center is up to individual property owners. Another informal commuter lot closed in 2008. Due to redevelopment, The Town Center of Aquia in North Stafford ended an informal commuter parking situation, displacing about 100 commuters.
To all concerned bloggers:
This will be my last entry, as I can see it is a complete waste of time to further explain the point of the article. Most of you “get it”, but there are a few who, for whatever reason, cannot understand…and who, instead, choose to make bizarre assumptions (and reach completely false conclusions) about the issue. To you, all I can say is “Thanks for your concern, but please don’t spend any more time worrying (or making assumptions) about us commuters. We will be just fine."
YES, we noticed heavy construction. NO, we didn’t ask “what was going on”; it was obvious: they were expanding the store. NO, we didn’t ask if parking would be affected. YES, we did think Walmart would be proactive and give us formal notice (considering they were going to tow vehicles). After parking there for 3 yrs (without complaints), YES, we considered permission to be granted. If not, Walmart had PLENTY of time to notify us. Most of us commuters tend to function based on facts, versus assumptions.
There has been heavy cionstrcuction going on in that shopping center in addition to the Walmart building expansion. Half the parking lot was fenced off as a work zone. Did you ever think to ask Walmart what was going on and might it affect the parking spaces you are using? Did you expect Walmart to be proactive and maybe put flyers on your windows? Did you ever ask Walmart for permission to park there?
Take a little responsibility for yourself man and not rely on others to take care of things for you.
More assumptions. How do you “assume” we are not already working towards our own resolution? Since the government is NOT fixing this, we WILL have to “fix it ourselves”. The point was to publicize that 100+ commuters are being displaced from a single lot with (at the time) 3 days notice. I guess it’s human nature to jump to wrong conclusions based on ignorance and poor assumptions. For that, unfortunately, I have no solution; and at this point, if you still don’t understand, then I cannot help you. Thanks!
I don’t understand how some people can read an article and make the assumptions they do. As far as “knowing it was coming”, we heard a rumor about it on Tues (Oct 6). We DID call Walmart and they told us the policy was effective on Fri (Oct 9). That’s 3 days notice. Do you really think 3 days is enough time to “work on a solution” to relocate 100+ commuters? It was only after the FLS contacted Walmart that they changed the date to Fri (Oct 16).
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