We the signed wish to have the Chick-Fil-A drive-thru in Santa Barbara retained. We recognize the use of the drive thru has caused concern for traffic congestion, however, we fundamentally believe the benefits of the Chick-Fil-A to the community and our community values outweigh the concerns. Moreover, we recognize that the removal of the drive thru likely won’t resolve the concern and may make it worse. 

Removing the Drive thru won't solve the problem and likely will make it worse: 

It is evident that the Chick-Fil-A is a popular restaurant as it serves hundreds of people a day. The average Chick-Fil-A takes in $5 Million in profit annually and anecdotally our Chick-Fil-A is more popular than the average store. The assumption is with the removal of the drive-thru lanes that the traffic will go away. Here, however if the drive thru is removed the traffic will still back up waiting for a spot to park at our popular restaurant. With removal of the drive thru lanes what is likely to happen is the speed of which people will flow through the lot will be dramatically reduced contributing to a backlog of vehicle's waiting to enter and park on the street. Vehicles will continue to wait on the street with our without the drive thru lanes until parking stalls open up.

Chick-Fil-A contributes greatly to our community: 

We estimate that our Chick-Fil-A provides the city a minimum of $500,000 in tax revenue. The restaurant provides jobs for dozens of people and provides excellent customer service training. In fact, it routinely receives accolades for its customer service and values. Many of its employees are young and make Chick-Fil-A their first job. Hundreds of people per day look forward to visiting Chick-Fil-A in Santa Barbara. The restaurant provides people a speedy opportunity to buy and receive food while at a reasonable cost. This is a large benefit to our community members who have busy lives or low-income. Generally, the food is also a healthy alternative to other fast food restaurants.

Its easy for us to put Chick Fil A into a category of “corporate” or “big business” but Chick-Fil-A restaurants are locally owned and operated employing Santa Barbara locals to serve Santa Barbarans.

We recognize the concern of our community members who dislike the congestion. We feel, however, the restaurant’s benefits and our community values outweigh the concern. Our counsel should balance the rights of enterprise and community interests against these concerns. Here, the inconvenience of driving through the area is minor, particularly when compared to other congestion and traffic concerns throughout the city. In comparison, the removal of the Chick-Fil-A drive through lanes which provide great value to our community is a drastic action which will have a real negative impact on our community.

Chick-Fil-A has made a legitimate attempt to resolve the issues and the congestion is a consequence of the driver’s actions:

Chick-Fil-A has made a conscious choice to try and resolve the problem. Over the years Chick-Fil-A has added signage and staff to mitigate the problem for the city. They added a second drive thru lane and additional employees to manage the lane and to usher vehicles out of the street and into the restaurant. Anyone entering the drive thru lanes can see the diligence in their efforts. Meanwhile drivers still make a conscious effort to violate ordinances by waiting in the street. It is fundamentally unfair to penalize the restaurant for the actions of others. Driver’s can take personal responsibility for the traffic.

Alternative Measures:

We believe the counsel should support the local Chick-fil-a and its customers rather than dis-allow the business to have drive thru lanes. Chick-fil-a has done all it can to mitigate the concerns but now it is the city’s turn to see what it can do through engineering and other means. The restaurant does attract traffic to the area, but this is a boon considering the dwindling attention the La Cumbre Mall area has been receiving. This is a good opportunity for the city to consider re-engineering the area to attract and accommodate more business while also reducing the congestion.

Santa Barbara City Counsel please consider these points and the opinions of the undersigned. Keep the drive-thru at our local Chick-fil-a.