121–130 of 432 posts
Lot of comments on building public transit first, before removing parking minimums. Public transit takes forever to build and its impossible to build usable transit with suburban sprawl. Usable transit --> reach destination in a reasonable time. Instead of public transit, cities should encourage Uber/Lyft. Car payments + insurance + gas + repairs/maintenance + parking might be close to $800 - $1000/month for most peo…
Where I live, politicians are also all for reducing the availability (amount + affordability) of city parking. At the same time, they cry about city centers (with their traditional shopping miles) dying out. Go figure.
In Los Angeles there are ~ 3 parking spaces per car, and < 1 housing unit per person. We mandate a bunch of parking for every new building, but no housing. Its no wonder that people live in cars.
LA is a disaster for transit and housing, but your numbers aren't a problem on their face. Any car being used will need >1 space at all times: one at home and one wherever it's being parked when its driver has gone somewhere. If you have We need far more parking spaces per car in LA once we consider the millions of people who are driving in the city and live outside of it. As far as housing, we'd have a 100% fully ho…
Actually, those numbers are a problem on their face. They're an illustration of why cars, and societies that are structured around enabling automobile transit as the primary (or even sole) means of transit, are inherently unsustainable and inefficient.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> 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 t…
Further, we should move to a model where the highways are paid entirely by usage fees (gas tax, tolls, etc) instead of subsidized. They're for the benefit of private operators, so the private operators should pay for them. The investments should be in public transit instead.
[EDIT] Incidentally, maybe we shouldn't subsidize truck shipping! But using usage taxes to pay for highways while not shifting the burden such that truck shipping is paying the lion's share of the cost and is no longer (so very much, at least) subsidized, would be making non-commercial drivers subsidize truck shipping (even more than they already are) which subsidy (to some degree) benefits everyone, including non-drivers, which seems like a weird and/or bad move to me.
It’s one thing to ditch parking minimums, but it has to be matched with investment in public transit. Simply eliminating parking spots doesn’t eliminate demand when there are no other options for getting around. And I suspect the public transit investment will be way more controversial and difficult to implement.
I wish they'd be a little less one-size-fits-all. Nixing parking minimums for businesses in already-walkable, transit-connected downtown cores is overdue, and areas close to that density can easily become new downtown cores when infill is allowed to cover their parking lots. Nixing parking minimums for downtown apartments, to your point, is a terrible idea (outside the densest areas of NYC at least, where parking min…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
When it comes to property development, anything that you leave to optionality in code enforcement ends up being a thing that never happens ever. For something to be available it has to be required by building codes.
Its expensive to build parking. Loads of shopping centers end up having to build seas of parking spaces due to these parking minimums given their square footage even though the actual car traffic wouldn't come close. I imagine a lot of those stores would have preferred paying for far less real estate and paving.
Not all square footage is created equal!
Earlier quoted context omitted.
When it comes to property development, anything that you leave to optionality in code enforcement ends up being a thing that never happens ever. For something to be available it has to be required by building codes.
Its expensive to build parking. Loads of shopping centers end up having to build seas of parking spaces due to these parking minimums given their square footage even though the actual car traffic wouldn't come close. I imagine a lot of those stores would have preferred paying for far less real estate and paving.
Where I live, politicians are also all for reducing the availability (amount + affordability) of city parking. At the same time, they cry about city centers (with their traditional shopping miles) dying out. Go figure.
You can't get rid of parking on its own. If there's plenty of mixed-use development around so people can walk/bike/transit to their destination, then things will be fine. If you're getting rid of parking AND the nearest residence is a mile away AND the only way to get around is by car AND you're not building anything new, then yes, it's silly.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The “let’s make life shittier for people so they’ll do the things I think are right” is bad politics and bad policy.
Worked for Europe. Everyone there lives in houses perhaps only half the size of a typical US home, and they're happy with it. Most people have the option to go live in the countryside, have a big house and drive a car, all for the same money, yet they choose to have a small city apartment and use public transport.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
When it comes to property development, anything that you leave to optionality in code enforcement ends up being a thing that never happens ever. For something to be available it has to be required by building codes.
> anything that you leave to optionality in code enforcement ends up being a thing that never happens ever No code requires marble countertops. Yet they get installed because buyers want them. Cities like Austin have regulated themselves into a housing-cost crisis. It’s almost a miracle that rational economic policy is being given space by voters.
Ironically, I still share your opinion about over regulation, but we can’t ignore the other argument.