HOLMES BEACH – Mayor Carmel Monti’s bold plan for a gondola system, a pavilion and a parking garage at Manatee Public Beach was met with kudos at last week’s meeting of Island elected officials.

“I love it! You are a real visionary,” Bradenton Beach Commissioner Jan Vosburgh exclaimed after the presentation.

“We talk about being stuck in traffic for hours and about embellishing the trolley system,” Monti began. “I went on line and found a gondola company.”

He said the company makes a smaller version of the ones used in Vail, Colo. The Colorado model moves 3,600 people an hour while the smaller version moves 500 to 600 people an hour.

“In this configuration, you have room for chairs, umbrellas, coolers – the things you don’t have room for on the trolley. If we could move 500 people from a parking lot on the other side (of the bridge) to a parking structure here, we could get a lot of people out of their cars.”

“It’s a mile-and-a-half from the Harbour Isle (on the Palma Sola Causeway) complex to the center of the public beach parking lot. If you look at a big bridge, it would be an eyesore, and it still won’t solve the traffic problem.”

He said the gondola system would cost $5 to 7 million per mile or about $10 million.

“It’s a way for us to start dealing with congestion,” he concluded.

Parking garage and pavilion

Monti’s slide show presentation included a proposal for a permanent pavilion on the south side of the public beach parking lot to be used for art festivals and other events.

“It could have a deck and a solid top,” he said. “Most of the events we have in in the city hall park have 40 to 50 vendors, and this could accommodate more.

“We could have farmer’s markets and other large events. The other good thing is it’s right next to the parking garage.”

Monti showed a three-story parking garage and noted, “Parking structures don’t have to be ugly. You could have a very open look with each terrace floor very nicely landscaped. The concept is to be more of a hub instead of a parking garage.”

He said there could be three floors, each 10 feet high, and “the bottom floor would be surrounded by bike rentals, electric vehicles, sundry shops, etc. The second floor would be office space or even residential. The third floor could be left open for events like the sock hops they used to have.”