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U.S. cities opt to ditch their off-street parking minimums

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Re: U.S. cities opt to ditch their off-street parking minimums

#41

Post by ericmay »

DoneWithAllThat wrote: post #13
coldpie wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Before: If you build a building of this size, you MUST also build at least X parking spaces. Now: If you build a building of this size, you MAY build as many parking spaces as you think you need. Seems like a strict improvement to me.

It’s not. I’ve lived in neighborhoods that did this and it was a nightmare. All street parking filling up by 4pm. Half hour walks to your car. Neighbors keying each others cars for taking up a space for too long. Guests basically just being SOL - you’d literally be unable to have guests over because if you left to pick them up there’d be no spot when you got back, and if they drove themselves they’d never find a spot…

> Neighbors keying each others cars for taking up a space for too long.

People need to stop being shitty to each other.

> Without readily available and reliable public transportation this is just lining developers pockets (because fewer parking spaces needed means more units they can build).

I don't think this is fair. Fewer parking spaces might mean higher profits for developers on a per-unit basis, but I'd rather them make money and provide more additional housing units that are sorely needed, especially in cities, than build apartment complexes with garages or parking which then necessitate higher taxes and more public spending to support roads, car crashes, and other related externalities.

"But public transit costs money too" yes, just redirect state highway department budgets to transit 1-1 and then you're not spending any more and getting higher ROI.

Re: U.S. cities opt to ditch their off-street parking minimums

#42

Post by oceanplexian »

swozey wrote: post #16
jmyeet wrote: post #7

The amount of money we collectively spend subsidizing driving is utterly insane. Yet every public transit measure is jet with the same tired dogma of “it’ll raise our taxes” or “it will run at a loss”. Street parking tons at a loss. Why is this never brought up? Significant money is spent by the likes of the remaining Koch brothers to fight public transit infrastructure in every city. Yet taking drivers off the road…

The middled/old-aged NIMBYs in the suburbs don't use Uber/Pub-trans so they don't care and don't want to ever vote for it being improved or "taking my tax dollars." They still equate public transportation with being poor and not how millions of people who live IN the city get around, nor how THEY can benefit from being able to come downtown or go to the mountains skiing more frequently. You know who wants tons of par…

> They still equate public transportation with being poor and not how millions of people who live IN the city get around.

I rode BART out of Oakland for years. I don’t agree with NIMBYs but it’s not like they are making it up.

I assure you, it is indeed full of insane people, homeless, the trains are nasty and smell like urine, frequently break down or get stopped because people regularly suicide themselves on the tracks. I’m sure in Asian countries the trains are fantastic but here people aren’t adults and ruin it for everyone.

Re: U.S. cities opt to ditch their off-street parking minimums

#43

Post by pc86 »

close04 wrote: post #27
_dain_ wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It sounds like the parking was underpriced. EDIT I am rate-limited so can't reply, but this part: "If you have 200 cars" This is only the case if the demand for parking / driving is perfectly inelastic, which would be quite extraordinary. Empirically, when you charge for parking or institute toll roads, traffic tends to fall, in some cases sharply (because many journeys are low value). I repeat: if the parking spaces…

Raising the price would just extract more value for the owners from a very limited resource. But the resource stays just as limited. If you have 200 cars and 50 parking spaces there's no price point at which the 200 cars can park simultaneously. The overflow ends up clogging the surrounding neighborhoods, on top of the outcome described by OP. Edit. @pc86, both points you make are valid but neither addresses or fixes…

> Raising the price would just extract more value for the owners from a very limited resource.

Yes. If you own a limited resource it's your right to make money from that. I know we like to pretend people making money from things they own is somehow evil but it's how all of civilization has been built and is an objectively good thing.

> If you have 200 cars and 50 parking spaces there's no price point at which the 200 cars can park simultaneously.

No, but is a point where 50 can park simultaneously and nobody who wants to park there and can afford to is denied that ability.

Re: U.S. cities opt to ditch their off-street parking minimums

#44

Post by TexanFeller »

swozey wrote: post #16
jmyeet wrote: post #7

The amount of money we collectively spend subsidizing driving is utterly insane. Yet every public transit measure is jet with the same tired dogma of “it’ll raise our taxes” or “it will run at a loss”. Street parking tons at a loss. Why is this never brought up? Significant money is spent by the likes of the remaining Koch brothers to fight public transit infrastructure in every city. Yet taking drivers off the road…

The middled/old-aged NIMBYs in the suburbs don't use Uber/Pub-trans so they don't care and don't want to ever vote for it being improved or "taking my tax dollars." They still equate public transportation with being poor and not how millions of people who live IN the city get around, nor how THEY can benefit from being able to come downtown or go to the mountains skiing more frequently. You know who wants tons of par…

Because statistically that’s very true almost everywhere in America. Even flagship cities like NYC have pathetic trains/subways compared to Europe/Asia and 90% of the population has never been that far abroad to see what’s possible. I’ve tried the express busses and “train”(can you call it that with only two cars!) in Austin and gave up because they waste much more time and are less comfortable than driving. Never saw rich professionals on them, but plenty of mentally ill, drug addicted, and unbathed(not that we should avoid the homeless as much as we do now) persons.

Re: U.S. cities opt to ditch their off-street parking minimums

#45

Post by mint2 »

1-6 wrote: post #21

I thought a generation of remote work would change attitudes about cities. Why are we still trying to cram into small spaces?

Because it’s nice to have practically every amenity possible in easy walking distance I.e 5-10 minutes walk.

Probably 20 restaurants, 20 small shops, coffee shops, ups, usps, fedex, hardware stores, museums, parks etc etc all within 10 minutes walk.

It’s nice not having to drive for everyday errands. driving and parking is soul draining and causes suburbs to be ugly, not to mention freeways. Those are ugly as sin.

Re: U.S. cities opt to ditch their off-street parking minimums

#46

Post by screye »

TexanFeller wrote: post #12

A big problem with this is the incredibly long payoff time. You make parking go from miserable to insufferable, but it will take a decade minimum for good public transit and making popular areas bikeable/walkable. Sad experience with government projects tells I’m being generous on the timescale. If you make the infrastructure problems in Austin more painful for a decade there will be a migration away and we might hav…

Bike infrastructure means some brick separators and painted lanes. It takes less than a month to build city-wide rudimentary protected bike lines.

BRT is similarly quick to implement, if a little more expensive. Remove 1 lane of parking from major downtown roads & replace with a painted BRT lane. Order about 50 buses to run in 1 way loops around the downtown area. Have high frequency BRT between the out-of-downtown parking area downtown core.

Either should be doable under 1 year.

The blockers are all political.

Re: U.S. cities opt to ditch their off-street parking minimums

#47

Post by thinkingtoilet »

oceanplexian wrote: post #22

> "I think our country has used its land wastefully, like a drunk lottery winner that's squandered their newfound wealth," said resident Tai Hovanky. This sounds like a comment from someone who lives in a city and doesn’t get out. There is an incredible, vast, mind-boggling amount of empty space in the US. I have flown and driven across the country many times. City dwellers are occupying a fraction of 1% of the space…

How is parking legislation like this forcing 'that lifestyle' on everyone else?

Re: U.S. cities opt to ditch their off-street parking minimums

#49

Post by [deleted] »

DoneWithAllThat wrote: post #15
londons_explore wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ditch off street parking and buildings will become much more dense, which in turn will make them more valuable (manhattan land is more valuable than suburbia), smaller (because people can't afford much space when land is expensive), which increases density further. End result: Nobody has space for a car, lots of demand for public transit, makes it worth building public transit. Unfortunately, there probably will be t…

The “let’s make life shittier for people so they’ll do the things I think are right” is bad politics and bad policy.

[deleted]

Re: U.S. cities opt to ditch their off-street parking minimums

#50

Post by Eisenstein »

oceanplexian wrote: post #22

> "I think our country has used its land wastefully, like a drunk lottery winner that's squandered their newfound wealth," said resident Tai Hovanky. This sounds like a comment from someone who lives in a city and doesn’t get out. There is an incredible, vast, mind-boggling amount of empty space in the US. I have flown and driven across the country many times. City dwellers are occupying a fraction of 1% of the space…

What would you consider Austin or the suburbs of Austin? If you live in a city or close enough to one, sprawl is terrible as it gives you all the cons of car dependence with fewer benefits of a concentrated population center. The rest of the country can decide they want to live 45 mins drive from a grocery store, but fixing car dependency in cities should be a priority, and I think you'd agree with that.
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