Will downtown Fresno parking, construction kill small shops? Some say they’re on the brink
Some downtown Fresno business owners say expensive and unpredictable parking rates coupled with massive construction projects are making it hard to stay in business.
One coffee shop owner says access roads and street parking have been blocked for four months, making customers less likely to visit. The owner of a gelateria says that while big corporations are being supported by the city, small businesses feel abandoned.
Beginning in January, construction projects spearheaded by the City of Fresno and private company Katch Environmental have shut down roads downtown. In February, the city assumed operations for downtown parking, and fees of $25 and over for special event parking followed.
Saul Pinedo, co-owner of Sacred Heart Coffee on Tuoulmne St, has found that event parking has not had as significant an impact on his business as construction. Because Sacred Heart closes at 4:00 pm most days of the week, special parking for nighttime events in the district is not an obstacle to customers.
However, daytime construction blocking parking down Tuolumne Street has created a dip in traffic to the coffee shop.
“You can’t park on Fulton or right in front of our shop, so I feel like that’s where it makes it kind of difficult for us,” Pinedo said, adding that even while construction blocks meter parking, surrounding areas that can serve as alternate parking will still be surveilled by parking enforcement officers.
“If there’s no space for anyone to park, I feel like there should be lenience,” Pineda said.
Lot parking is open to the public at the intersection of Tuolumne St and Van Ness Ave, but a fee of $11 must be paid for up to 10 hours of parking.
Directly next to Sacred Heart Coffee sits BB’s Gelateria, opened by Stacy Williams in January 2025. When construction began in early 2026, Williams was unsure what the impact on BB’s would be. Subsequently, for around four months, Tuolumne Street was closed down from Van Ness Avenue to Broadway Street so that there was only one way through traffic.
Later, Fresno Street was also closed down, with its usual bus routes and traffic being redirected to Tuolumne. Two simultaneous construction projects coupled with the rerouting of Fresno Street created a strain on Williams’s business.
“We’ve seen about a 20% decrease in our sales from last January through April to this January through April ,” Williams said.
Unlike Sacred Heart, BB’s has also found itself affected by event parking. “Anybody who’s doing events, they’ll start blocking off our two parking lots right here and start charging 10, 15, to 25 dollars. And then our folks have nowhere to park,” Williams said.
At one point, Williams emailed Katch to ask for details of their construction plans so she could brace the business. She did not receive a response. Williams also contacted the city’s Department of Public Works, to no avail.
“I think it’s perfect storm of poor planning on the city’s part, right? Poor communication and also poor planning on how are we going to support small businesses during all of these months of construction,” Williams said. “They could’ve done a temporary parking situation. They could have said ‘You can park across the street, or over here, this is our help for you.’ They could have relaxed ticketing, the meters in this area. But they’re still out here in full force ticketing people while it’s a mess.”
Williams noticed that while small businesses downtown suffer, Costco was granted a $40 million waiver for developer fees by the Fresno Planning Commission.
“It really shows that they want corporations like Costco, but they really don’t want mom-and-pop shops like me,” she said.
The city is pushing to revitalize downtown via the construction of high-speed rail and crowded weekend events, but Williams worries that the road closures may shutter businesses that have already invested in the area, including hers.
She pointed out, “We can die in six months if we have no traffic.”
This story was originally published May 15, 2026 at 3:18 PM.