Valet Parking

DOWNTOWN GLENDALE -- Four men were arrested Thursday afternoon on suspicion of robbing a man of his gold watch at gunpoint. The robbery occurred about 3:21 p.m. Thursday on the east sidewalk in the 100 block of South Orange Street, Glendale Police spokeswoman Officer Leticia Chang said. The identities of the four men were not available Thursday night because the men did not have any identification, Chang said, adding that detectives were awaiting fingerprint confirmation.

Income from parking fees took a nose dive at Bob Hope Airport in January, dropping about 6.2% compared to the same period last year, according to the latest figures released this week. Parking fees - an important revenue source - generated $1.5 million for the airport in January, down from almost $2 million during the same month last year, according to a report to the Burbank-Glendale-Pasadena Airport Authority on Monday. At the same time, the number of passenger using the airfield continued to slide, decreasing by 2.2%.

Josh Kleinbaum Customers running late for a movie at the Mann Glendale Exchange movie theaters will soon have a saving grace -- valet parking. The Glendale Redevelopment Agency voted 4-0 Tuesday to approve a host of changes for the Exchange's parking structure designed to improve circulation flow in the parking structure and on Maryland Avenue. In the structure itself, two bidirectional entrances and exits will be converted to one two-lane entrance and one two-lane exit.

Robert Shaffer DOWNTOWN -- After an eight-month closure to fix a broken water main, the northbound lane of Orange Street downtown has reopened. And David Fogiel couldn't be happier. "It has affected us greatly," Fogiel, manager of Billy's restaurant and deli on Orange, said Monday. "It's been such a hassle, a real pain." The construction, part of the collateral damage of the city building a parking garage on the street, has cost Billy's $120,000 over nine months, Fogiel said.

It is easy for homeowners associations to get reputations with a whole slate of “not in my backyard”-related positions ranging from oversized mansions to businesses behaving badly. Some of these are deserved, I suppose, but many more are justified. The problems that residents of Adams Hill have with the latest incarnation of the De Revolution restaurant (“Troubled restaurant may be allowed to reopen,” June 12) is a clear case of the latter. The issues Neighborhood Services presented at the conditional-use permit revocation hearing before Zoning Administrator Edith Fuentes focused primarily on whether De Revolution’s operations without building permits and with expanded seating violated the terms of their original conditional-use permits.

Buck Wargo DOWNTOWN - Downtown shoppers will have another place to park, starting Wednesday morning. The $13-million, 620-space Orange Street parking garage is scheduled to open Wednesday, pending inspections today by the Fire Department. Formal ceremonies have been put off until December when the final touches are made to the garage. The opening is seen as a blessing to many merchants along Brand Boulevard and Orange Street. Many of them saw fewer customers walk through their doors because of the closure of Orange Street and the elimination of a surface parking lot on the site.

Jody Kussin The secret society of fancy suburban ladies is a topic that is frequently overlooked by sociologists and anthropologists alike. You never see PBS specials nor National Geographic documentaries on the subject. Nonetheless, it is an important area for exploration and study. As a mom, as a professional, and as a woman, I am quite fascinated with the habits, norms, and mores of the aforementioned group. For instance, is there a special training program that covers topics such as air kissing, car pool politicking and exclusive birthday lunches?

Free parking is not the solution This is in response to a letter by Claude W. Soderstrom (“Parking charge is bad for business,” Jan. 1) regarding minimal fee charges for parking at the Americana at Brand. Any time you do last-minute holiday shopping at 3 p.m. Christmas Eve, you’re taking risks in finding available parking. Next to Black Friday, Christmas Eve is the second busiest shopping day of the year. Soderstrom calculated the numbers from the roof the Galleria Parking Structure, which fronts the Americana garage to the north.

Ben Godar As Burbank-Glendale-Pasadena Airport officials continue to fight for customers against a new, privately owned parking lot, the Airport Authority is planning to further cut parking rates and upgrade its signs. The authority, following a closed-session meeting Monday, announced it would spend $109,000 on new signs directing customers to its parking lots. The signs will be posted along airport property to replace existing, smaller signs, airport spokesman Victor Gill said.