The San Francisco 49ers are getting ready to open their season in the brand new Levi’s Stadium in August, but apparently, the parking plans for the new stadium are anything but concrete. The San Francisco Chronicle reported on Sunday that the team wants to put a stadium parking lot on the site of former 49ers legend Joe Montana’s planned hotel and entertainment center going up next door, and are threatening to block Montana’s development project if another site cannot be found.
“Their position has been that unless we find other parking acceptable to them, they may not allow the project to go forward,” City Manager Julio Fuentes told the Chronicle.
The 49ers claim that a 2012 deal with the city of Santa Clara promises the team 789 parking spots on the land across the street from the stadium, the site that Montana Property Group wants to use to build a $400 million hotel and retail complex.
Both the team and the city have made offers to try and fix the situation, each of which have been unsuccessful. The 49ers reportedly asked the city to use youth soccer fields as parking lots, a proposal the City Council outright rejected, and the city has apparently offered the team 4,000 spots at various locations close to the stadium, with the 49ers claiming the sites are unsuitable for parking.
The team has also flatly refused to share the parking spots with Montana; according to the report, team President Larry MacNeil wrote a letter to the city in February, demanding Santa Clara provide an 8.5-acre replacement parking lot should they approve Montana’s development project.
Still, Santa Clara Mayor Jamie Matthews is optimistic: “This is the beginning of the discussion,” she told the Chronicle. “I’m sure we will work through the issues.”
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