Legality of Parking at the Ferry Terminal Continues to Worry Harbor Committee
Plans for site still being refined
BAR HARBOR—According to a legal opinion from the town’s attorney at Rudman Winchell, utilizing the 50 parking spaces at the town’s ferry terminal site on Eden Street as free public parking is legal, however, several on the town’s Harbor Committee expressed doubts about that assessment on Monday.
“Right now they have publicized it as parking that is available,” Harbor Committee Chair Jeff Miller said. State law and our local ordinance states that it has to be in compliance with a marine usage, he said.
At last week’s Parking Solutions Task Force meeting, members also discussed the legality of the 50 spots that exist at the site after Harbormaster Christopher Wharff told them the attorney’s opinion.
The town purchased the 121 Eden Street location in 2018. It was first built for the Bluenose ferry in 1956.
“We’re not going to wade into it at this moment. We’re going to choose our fight at this moment,” Miller said. He later added, “I think that’s an argument that needs to be addressed in the future.”
Member Robert Garland said, “That would be one expensive parking lot.”
Miller said he’d rather turn around and sell it to become a hotel and get the town’s money back than have it be undeveloped and only a parking lot. That was not an option discussed at the committee meeting nor at the Parking Solutions Task Force last week. It is, however, currently being used as free parking. The task force members had advocated that the town advertise that more and that visitors or workers could use the Island Explorer shuttle to get to town.
Town Council Chair and council candidate Valerie Peacock said that in a past parking committee meeting where the spaces had been discussed, the tone was that the marina is the priority. She said there aren’t many cars using those parking spaces when she drives by.
Member Kaitlyn Mullen said that she sees mostly RVs and “only every now and again.”
Miller reiterated that he believes it’s stepping out on a limb to say that’s it legal.
In a June 20, 2021 letter to the members of the committee and the Town Council, Arthur Grief raised legal concerns about parking as a “primary use” at the town-owned lot writing,
State guidelines from the Department of Environmental Protection have also spoken to the specific uses in a shoreland zone.
Wharff was unable to make the Harbor Committee meeting at the town’s Municipal Building on Monday, but Garland, Miller, Pancho Cole, Secretary Jamie Weir, Vice Chair Larry Nuesslein III, and Kaitlyn Mullen attended, giving a quorum for the 11-member committee. The committee currently doesn’t intend to meet in July or August and its next scheduled meeting will be September 11.
POTENTIAL MARINA SITE UPDATE
Multiple Harbor Committee members worried Monday afternoon about the forward progress of GEI Consultants (the company working with the Harbor Committee on the town’s master plan for the former ferry terminal).
According to Miller, Travis Pryor, GEI’s person currently in charge of the proposal for the site said that he plans to make some tweaks based on last month’s meeting with the committee, and potentially his conversation with other stakeholders, if they occurred, for different options no later than Tuesday so that Wharff could print them for the June 13 town meeting. That meeting was last week. However, the election is June 13. The committee members did not know if Wharff received any plans and after a suggestion from Peacock who said it would be good to have a bit more of a plan about interacting with the plans and the public, decided to postpone the outreach.
According to Miller, Pryor said that GEI intends to develop the concept through August, present to the committee in the fall for public comment, and then revise and present for public comment by December 31.
Garland said he’d previously been happy with the last consultant within the company that worked with the town, but felt like the current care and interaction wasn’t up to the same level.
Miller agreed that it felt like it was moving at glacial speed. Peacock said she believed that they all have the timeline of the plan and it didn’t feel far off that official timeline. Peacock said the project was a flat-fee contract paid for via a state grant.
Warrant Committee member Carol Chappell said she’d like a public presentation so that people can see before getting comments because there are so many options. Miller said that they’ve been soliciting feedback for a long time and that people have been given chances to participate.
“This is not a secret mission that is being developed,” Milller said and that there’s been a public process, public meeting, and GEI has reached out to stakeholders. The big picture of soliciting input has been done, he said, “We’re at a point where we’re trying to sharpen the image. We’re working on the details of what might potentially be built there.”
What might potentially be built there is a marina currently and the details have to do with elements of that plan.
Garland asked if Pryor had given Miller a list of the stakeholders he’d been in contact with? Miller said he hadn’t.
Garland said at the meeting prior to that they were lacking a lot of information about the stakeholders that were contacted. He said he thought Chappell’s viewpoint had validity and though he also understood that the public has been involved that there should be some information presented again to the public. “I think we need to rattle his (Pryor’s) cage big time and find out how much they’ve done and they intend to do.”
Nuesslein agreed that it feels like the company has kind of given up
There are currently no plans posted on the website. The ferry terminal page’s last update is the FEI Engineering final report below.
Peacock and Chappell attended as members of the public.
VOTING REMINDER
The town election of officers, a school construction bond, and four amendments to the land use ordinance are all up for vote today at the Bar Harbor Municipal Building on Cottage Street. Polls are open from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m.
For interviews with Town Council candidates, click here. For Warrant Committee candidates, click here. For a story about the proposed land use amendments click here, and our latest story about the school construction bond, click here.
LINKS TO LEARN MORE
https://barharborstory.substack.com/p/satellite-parking-not-allowed-at