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Uptown residents press Sedona council for more wildfire and EV-safety study on planned Uptown parking garage
Summary
Multiple Uptown Sedona residents urged the council to pause or revisit the Uptown parking garage project, citing recent changes in national fire-safety standards for parking structures and risks posed by electric-vehicle (EV) batteries, limited water pressure in Uptown, and the garage's location on a primary evacuation route.
Residents of Uptown Sedona used the council's public-forum period to press city leaders for more information and for a pause on the Uptown parking-garage project pending additional safety studies.
At the Feb. meeting several speakers warned the planned multi-level garage could increase evacuation risk and pose a higher fire hazard because of electric vehicles and EV charging stations. Jen Farnsworth said the 2022 National Fire Protection Association standard (NFPA 88A) reclassified parking structures'fire hazards and, she said, required communities to reassess siting and safety. "This hasn't happened," Farnsworth told the council, and she urged a suspension of construction until a comprehensive safety and evacuation analysis was completed.
Other speakers echoed that concern. Allison Nichols told the council that California experiences following recent fires showed that garages had not helped evacuees and that debris and hazardous residues may cross state lines; Joe Zanni, a member of the 2023 parking-garage task force, said the task force did not consider the NFPA reclassification when it made recommendations and called withholding that information a "fatal flaw" in the process.
Speakers asked the city to provide the public with two items: 1) an assessment of the garage's design and fire-safety features specific to EVs and the wildland-urban-interface environment, and 2) a public report on water-supply pressure and capacity for the Uptown area. Several said they want an independent evacuation-time analysis for the Forest Road Extension escape route and an assessment of whether the garage would impede that route.
Council did not immediately respond to requests for study or a construction pause during public comment; the mayor and staff said questions could be directed to staff after the meeting. No formal action was taken at the meeting.
Why it matters: Uptown is a high-density, high-tourism area that the speakers said has constrained egress and variable water pressure. Changes in fire-code guidance and the increased presence of EVs introduce different failure modes for parking structures; residents want the city to show it has accounted for those changes before completing the project.
What the city has said: City staff previously briefed the task force and council and have identified the Uptown garage as a city project. At the meeting staff referred speakers to post-meeting follow-up and said any required engineering or safety changes would be handled through project permitting and review.
What to watch for next: Residents asked the council to commission or publish: (a) wildfire-evacuation modeling for Uptown (time-to-clear metrics for the Forest Road Extension and alternate routes), (b) a water-pressure assessment for fire suppression in Uptown, and (c) an engineering review of EV-fire mitigation measures for the garage. The council may ask staff to return with specific cost and schedule estimates for additional studies and to report whether the project schedule should be paused pending those studies.
Provenance: Public-forum comments on garage safety and NFPA changes (00:23:12'00:41:16).
