This Chick-fil-A could be declared a ‘public nuisance’ in California. Here’s why

A Chick-fil-A restaurant in California may soon be declared a “public nuisance” because of long/ drive-thru lines, local media reports.

The Santa Barbara restaurant, at 3707 State St.,. is wildly popular among college students and other residents of the city. But the restaurant’s ever-present drive-thru line spills into one of the city’s busiest streets, posing difficulty for drivers who have to navigate around it, the Santa Barbara Independent reported.

According to city reports, the backup of vehicles also block driveways of other businesses, force city buses to stall as they try to navigate to their stop, and increase the risk of collisions for cars and cyclists, SFGate reported.

Because of the ongoing issues, the city’s police chief, traffic engineer and community director consider the “consistent traffic backup” onto the street a “public nuisance,” the outlet reported.

A city staff report said that if the business is declared a public nuisance, the city could alter the company’s operations or shut down the company’s ability to have a drive-thru, Noozhawk reported.

The restaurant, known for its chicken sandwiches and waffle fries, has taken measures to mitigate the issue, including hiring additional employees, posting signs to highlight proper entry and exit points, hiring third-party traffic control, and trying to help customers understand that it’s illegal to block sidewalks or stop on the street, franchise operator Travis Collins told Noozhawk in February.

“We want nothing more than to be a good neighbor,” Collins told the outlet.

But those measures didn’t eradicate the problem, according to a traffic analysis by the city, which shows the right lane of the eastbound street is blocked by customers’ cars for up to 91 minutes on weekdays and 155 minutes on Saturdays, the Santa Barbara Independent reported.

Officials will address the issue during a public hearing on June 7, when the city council will present an ordinance with findings to support declaring “a public nuisance arising from operations of the Chick-fil-A restaurant,” the city of Santa Barbara said in a news release. Until then, the city will continue to “work with Chick-fil-A to evaluate approaches to abating the nuisance,” the news release said.

According to the Santa Barbara News-Press, Councilmember Kristen Sneddon said at the March 1 council meeting that the restaurant has simply outgrown its site — an issue that neither the city nor the company can fix.

“This is not about the goodness of the company or the goodness of the owners and certainly not about the goodness of the employees,” Sneddon said, according to the Santa Barbara News-Press. “Chick-fil-A has a good problem here. They are so successful, they have outgrown their site. It’s possible they were oversized for that site to begin with.”