A parking lot is a parking space, right?
Well, not if you frequent, or do business in, the little strip mall at the corner of Westminster Highway and Minoru Boulevard in Richmond.
When you talk to the customers and business owners below, it’s anything but “one-stop parking,” where traffic cones dictate where you can and can’t park.
From car doors being openly kicked in and people being spat on, to business owners chasing customers from other businesses around the mall, this little corner of Richmond has it all.
Richmond resident Lilian Li said she was shocked when an employee at one of the businesses, Panago Pizza, ran up and started kicking in the door of her car parked outside the store.
“We were going to buy pizza but first we sat in the car for less than a minute,” Li told ang Richmond NEwSwho shared his experience on the Chinese-language social media platform Little Red Book.
“A Panago employee ran up to my car and kicked my car door like a madman. He was also drooling and yelling at me and my mom when we opened the door. We were both shocked.”
The kicking, spitting never happened: Secret Owner
The incident was denied by Andus Lau, owner of the Panago store, who said “it never happened.”
“If that happens, they should call the police. Do they have a police file?” Lau told the NEwSadded that there was not enough information available to check the store’s CCTV.
A few others shared similar experiences in Google Reviews of the store – when they stopped in the Panago parking lot temporarily for emergencies, claiming they were told off by an angry employee from the store.
Lau also denied the accusations but admitted there were “parking issues” at the mall.
“We rent where we pay and you see this line, it has ‘Panago Pizza’,” Lau said.
“I’m not getting defensive or anything but if you park in the wrong place and we tell you to move, if you don’t move, five minutes, five minutes, every day, what do you think? How do you feel?
“We will ask them to leave…I am not here to fight.”
Disputes over parking common in the mall
Store owners at the strip mall said they did not witness the incident Li claimed, but have seen conflicts with customers parking in the wrong spots at the strip mall over the years.
And it has become more common in the last two years after the arrival of Tasty BBQ & Beer Bar, a popular barbecue and grill restaurant.
“It’s a very common thing here. At first, we were angry, but now we’re used to it,” said a member of staff at Tasty BBQ & Beer Bar, who asked to remain anonymous.
“When someone parks in a Panago parking spot, regardless of whether they are our customers or not, a store employee will come to knock on their windshield, yell at them, or follow them to the store they are visiting and ask them to move the car, ” he said.
He told the NEwS once, a Panago employee wrote down the plate number of a car parked in its lot, entered their restaurant and showed the note to every customer “right in their face.”
Another time an employee smashed the window of Tasty BBQ & Beer Bar before yelling at them to remove a car.
Flaman Fitness in that mall also had customers followed by a Panago employee who entered its store and asked to take their car.
In a video he showed on NEwSthe employee stood near the customer, who was paying his bill at the counter, and asked him to remove his car immediately.
“He was very aggressive… literally in his face. It’s really shocking,” said Mike Logan, the store manager.
“[The customer] told me later, ‘I’m going to buy a pizza when I get to your store, and that’s why I parked in his place, but he didn’t give me a second to explain myself.’”
Failure due to parking
Some store owners said, however, they were disappointed with Panago’s parking.
In a small strip mall with limited parking, the parking lots fill up quickly during the lunch and dinner hours and many customers park in the lots of other businesses.
“I can’t speak for Panago but in our case, we are often attacked by customers,” said the owner of 4 Stones Vegetarian Cuisine, a restaurant next to Tasty BBQ & Beer Bar.
“A lot of customers are unreasonable. They park in our place and go somewhere else, and when we asked them to move, some of them gave a bad attitude.”
Tired of arguing and chasing customers, they put a cone in two of their five designated parking lots and only removed it when the driver confirmed that he was their customer.
“However, some customers push our cone and forcefully park there. Some are even parking in front of our fire exit in the back,” he said, adding that a tow truck might come one day so that won’t help much.
Ako Wada, owner of Tokyo Allure Hair Studio, said she also has parking spots taken by other customers and it should be fine to ask them to move them. But since the studio closes at dinner time, it’s less affected than restaurants like Panago.
Logan, who also has a sign outside his store reminding customers from other stores not to park there during business hours, said he understands Panago employees may be upset about parking but he was sad to see things develop this way.
“They don’t have enough slots and everyone is trying to park in their spots, which I understand is difficult,” added Logan.
“They’re doing everything they can and it’s been going on like this for 10 years, and COVID is putting more pressure on everything.
“But they need to calm down.”