Parks officials on Wednesday night voted in favor of allowing the Caffeine & Carburetors gathering of classic and specialty auto enthusiasts at Waveny on two Sundays in 2015.
Under an agreement between the Recreation Department and town resident Doug Zumbach, owner of a gourmet coffee shop on Pine Street and one of the popular event’s founders, Caffeiene & Carburetors will be held from 6:30 to 11:30 a.m. on May 10 and Oct. 18.
Zumbach on Thursday is to go before an administrative team known as the “Special Events Committee” and Board of Selectmen approval is required for the contract.
The commission asked Zumbach to ask exhibitors to register in advance (which they’re doing, 370 had signed up by Thursday, he said), restrict the number of cars in the park (460 exhibiting cars can park in Waveny), require a donation to the New Canaan Food Pantry in lieu of an admission fee “somehow work with the vendors and stress in town to promote them,” Chairman Sally Campbell said at the meeting, held in the Douglass Room at Lapham Community Center.
The commission voted 5-3 in favor of the two Waveny dates.
Caffeine & Carburetors Parking Plan for Waveny.
Commissioner Joan Guzzetti, who cast a dissenting vote, said during the meeting that she enjoys Caffeiene & Carburetors personally and thinks that Waveny can handle the event.
“I’m really pleased with the way we are exercising a little more control over the dialogue and what gets done, she said. “I’m not even worried about if we do this it’s a slippery slope. We can make a good judgment when other people come before us. On the other hand, I guess just because it is a big deal, it’s a big event for the park, and I’m a little wary of the appropriateness of it. And the fact that we are not just allowing C&C to have this one-time event in New Canaan. It’s already going to be here twice and we will be voting for the third and fourth time, and I just don’t buy into the essentialness of it.”
Under the contract—itself a modified version of what the town has in place with Summer Theatre of New Canaan—the Recreation Department may in lieu of charging a fee to Caffeine & Carburetors for making use of the park for the gathering (as it does, say, Waveny House for a wedding), require a donation to a Special Projects Fund to be used to improve Waveny.
The agreement also calls for Zumbach to provide liability insurance, a $1,000 cleanup bond and to do many things that he’s seen to in the several years that Caffeine & Carburetors has been running, such as securing permits to sell coffee and communicate via the event’s website and Facebook page with participants.
Zumbach also pays for all police who help manage the show, recruits, outfits and trains volunteers who help with parking and sees to it that Waveny is cleaned up quickly and completely after Caffeine & Carburetor is finished.
Exhibitors will be able to enter Waveny from either side, and overflow parking will go onto Lapham Road, Zumbach said at the meeting. Commissioners requested that someone at either side keep a running tally of how many cars on are site.
Visitors may park at New Canaan High School lot, and Zumbach under the contract must get the district’s OK prior to posting signage on Board of Education property.
That’s great!! I’ll be attending.