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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

#321

Post by sokoloff »

throw0101d wrote: post #82
pc86 wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Let's pay 3x as much for rent [and other things that more expensive with density] to save $300/mo on a car payment" is certainly an interesting life choice. More seriously though I do think there are benefits to city living if that's a lifestyle you want, but saving money is almost never one of them unless you have a job where you can make a LOT more living in the city, which sort of by definition means you're not g…

> "Let's pay 3x as much for rent [and other things that more expensive with density] to save $300/mo on a car payment" is certainly an interesting life choice. Try $1000/mo on average: * https://money.com/owning-new-car-cost-total-2023/ If you're making >$100K that may not sound like that much, but the average/median US salary is lower. (That probably doesn't include externalities either: health, climate change, comm…

That's the average total cost to own a new car, not the average total cost to own a car. The average car is something like 12 years old, so the average cost will be significantly less. I haven't had a car payment for something like 22 years. Over that time, used cars have gotten to be better than new cars in the 80s used to be.

> it'd be better if they were option for living your life rather than a necessity

I totally agree with that. I 100% support other people having the option to own or not own a car and accept the tradeoffs that result from their choice.

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

#322

Post by anamax »

mint2 wrote: post #45
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.

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

It might be "nice", but it's not possible without a very restricted definition of "every amenity" and even then there's an assumption that amenities are fungible and you're ignoring efficiency.

If there's a grocery store every five minute walk, it's relatively small, which means that it has a crap selection AND it's expensive to run because it doesn't have any economies of scale. (Compare NYC's bodegas with even a crap Walmart and god help you if you're not the dominant community near your bodega.)

The number of places to eat/drink within a five minute walk is limited and/or they're tiny. Again, crap selection and no economies of scale.

Then consider our musician friends. Do you really think that NYC supports enough instrument stores to have one, let alone a good one, every five minute walk? (Remember, you need guitars, flutes, pianos, etc.)

And, musicians aren't special here - the same is true of any interest, such as books.

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

#323

Post by anamax »

dublinben wrote: post #311
dylan604 wrote: post #294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

that's yet another reason city dwelling in a multi-tenant building is just not conducive for many people. I couldn't imagine not being able to work on projects. Of course, having the desire/inclination of having that kind of hobby is probably something a city slicker just isn't going to do. I have wood working and machine working tools that I'm just going to lean towards not being allowed by whatever building rules.…

There's nothing inherently incompatible with living an a walkable community and participating in hobbies like woodworking. For example, after just a few minutes of searching, here's the first listing I found of a condo in a building that includes an expansive workshop among other amenities. (See photo 52.) This is in a location with a 92 walk and bike score, and a 78 transit score.[0] If that's not to your liking, he…

> There's nothing inherently incompatible with living an a walkable community and participating in hobbies like woodworking.

Okay, so there are 10 buildings (out of several thousand) with woodworking in Minneapolis, but how many of them also support what my spouse likes to do?

This is a case where you don't want it in the building, which gets us to the "there's not enough space within a 5 minute walk for a wide range of `want to do's."

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

#324

Post by bombcar »

smt88 wrote: post #59
georgeecollins wrote: post #48

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…

Parking spaces per car is akin to toilets per person.

An interesting metric but not definitive and comparable.

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

#325

Post by bombcar »

michael1999 wrote: post #202
oh_sigh wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is 3 parking spaces per car inherently unsustainable?

3 parking spaces is ~750sqft. A moving car is another 2000sqft. Once population density passes ~3 stories, the geometry stops working. Once drive time exceeds an hour or two, the math stops working. It's the urban rocket equation.

They’re not additive - a car can’t be parked and moving at the same time.

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

#326

Post by bombcar »

bluGill wrote: post #230
huntertwo wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you think about it, three parking spaces take up way less space than 1 housing unit in LA.

Most housing units will have more than one person, and most of those people have cars. In most cities space dedicated to cars (parking and roads) covers about 50% of all land use. Housing, factories, stores, parks, churches, and the like are the other half. Note that the above is about land area. Housing units are often stacked vertically, while car parking rarely stacked.

Where land is actually precious, parking gets stacked.

Where it is not stacked, it’s obviously not that terribly valuable.

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

#327

Post by snake_doc »

anamax wrote: post #322
mint2 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

> Because it’s nice to have practically every amenity possible in easy walking distance I.e 5-10 minutes walk. It might be "nice", but it's not possible without a very restricted definition of "every amenity" and even then there's an assumption that amenities are fungible and you're ignoring efficiency. If there's a grocery store every five minute walk, it's relatively small, which means that it has a crap selection…

You clearly have never lived in convenient (but high costs) parts of Manhattan.

A 10min walk/transit window can span 20-40 city blocks depending on the location and transit options.

All of your assertions are plain wrong.

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

#328

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

Eisenstein wrote: post #238
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The other tactic would be to actually build out viable public transportation.

The other tactic is 'do something to reduce car dependency'.

That's my whole point. Just getting rid of parking doesn't reduce car dependency if there aren't better alternatives.

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

#329

Post by bombcar »

mint2 wrote: post #45
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.

A ten minute walk is half to 3/4 of a mile. I doubt you can find all those things in that distance except in the densest of cities.

And even then you might be quite restricted as similar stores seem to clump together.

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

#330

Post by bombcar »

chung8123 wrote: post #283
rcpt wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> live in the suburbs and I still have almost every amenity walking distance Are you sure you live in a suburb?

Of course I am sure. If you plan where you live you can live in the suburbs just fine and still be able to walk most places. I have done it in the last few places I have lived. They even have bus routes. Suburbs can be walk-able for those that make it a priority. Many don't care and will pick their homes with different criteria.

The core of the fight comes down to “others use criteria I don’t like so I must force them to choose as I do”.
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