A day at the beach, Lake Worth Style

Yesterday, being one of those days weather-wise that you would like to capture and save in a bottle, sent out a clarion call to go to the beach.  Also contributing to this compulsion was the fact that I am entertaining someone from Dallas for a few days.  He used to live in south Florida and we ran around together some twenty-two years ago.  We got up at a rather leisurely hour, given that he, another friend and I had sampled the rich and fecund night life offerings of our fair city.  Upon meeting our immediate biological and hygienic requirements, we sought a place to satiate our hunger for food.  After tossing around a few ideas, we decided that the Benny's at the Beach would be a good place and it would offer my Texas friend a chance to re-acquaint himself with the Atlantic Ocean.  We scampered to our vehicle and arrived at the beach, making sure that before I left that I brought my camera with us.

As we passed the crest of the Lake Worth bridge and continued east, we notice the Lake Worth Farmers Market still in full swing.  And my guest mentions that after brunch, we should drop by there.  For no particular reason, we didn't take advantage of the suggestion.  My Texas friend notices the construction taking place at the casino building site and asks me how's that going.  Not wanting to spoil a pleasant morning with a long explanation, I said, "The devil is in the details."  And that seemed to satisfy his curiosity enough that there were no further questions.  We rounded the curve at the south end of the property, got the first clear glimpse of the ocean and then we went to park in the upper parking lot.  At this time, my friend points out some long lines in the middle of the parking lot and asks, "What is that about?"  I said that the city took out the meters and that the BCE and BCME recently replaced the automated meters with a different kind of automatic meter system.  He said that seems like a faulty system if there are lines like this all the time.  I agreed.

We park and get in line at the nearest meter station.  You must remember your parking space number, spray painted in faded yellow at the entrance to your parking space, and enter it into the machine.  But, before you do that you have to wait in line.  I took some pictures of the sort of line that we experienced and saw in other areas of the parking lot.

There was a lot of chatter in the line that we were in about the process.  "Why is this taking so long?"  "Oh, it's the city, they decided these things."  "I guess it's not the city, but all cities are like this."  "Two dollars an hour to park? WOW!" etc.

We were in line about 15 to 20 minutes after a lot of multiple exasperated attempts to get a ticket by those ahead of us in line.  The guy immediately in front of us tried to use his debit card no fewer than four times and the machine said that his card was unreadable.  He said wouldn't come back - it was a new card that shouldn't have any problems being read.  He didn't want to take the risk of getting a ticket - so he and his family of four left.

We had a little more luck in one way, not so much in another.  You enter your space number first, then it asks you for the amount of time that you want.  The screen starts at 0 hours and there are various buttons there - one saying "add time."  When you hit that button, it adds time, but suddenly you see that it says $4.00, for two hours, instead of $2.00 for one hour.  There is no "subtract time" button.  The number pad buttons didn't do anything to change the display, so the city, in essence, was forcing us to pay $2 more for an hour we didn't need.  I guess now we understand the optimistic parking revenue estimates presented by the BCME and included in the business plan for the casino building.  We finally got our ticket and the next person in line started grumbling about the machine.

And, this got me to thinking of this being just one of the many legacies of the BCME and how the personality of these parking meters strangely reflected her limited skills in dealing with the public in a fair and honest manner.  Unfortunately, we will all be able to identify, with stunning frequency, a number of similar legacies, some with severe financial consequences.  Then I thought how much of a waste of opportunity it was to insist that the casino building location was a given in the design of the beach redevelopment plan.  If the city had exercised more flexibility in the location of that building, it could have developed a workable site plan that would have allowed for attended parking lots (or at least the most heavily utilized lot) - 100% collection, lines (if there were any) would be at the end of one's visit to the beach and it could also employ a parking validation program on the part of the beach businesses where they essentially pay for their customers parking.  My friend pointed out to me that the city is already paying money to someone to enforce parking there - couldn't that money be spent for an attendant?  Apparently, that whole idea made too much sense and there were more political chits to fry by the BCE in doing it the way it is being done.  Well, we are living with the result and will be for quite some time.

I love Benny's and we had a very nice meal - but forget any notion of it being an "egalitarian" diner for the masses.  Our brunch for three was $50 with tip.

Other pictures from our visit:

There is no working shower north of the pier.  The small print of the sign directs you to go south of the pier where one was working.

 

After we left, my local friend, who is not an urban planner, pointed out that Rudy Guiliani helped turn around New York City by focusing on the little things  - like customer service, working showers at the beach, etc - and that the big things will take care of themselves.  We would be wise to focus on these "little things."