Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Tear up unused parking lots, plant trees

danrodricks.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 389 posts

Re: Tear up unused parking lots, plant trees

#81

Post by stefan_ »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #79
coldpie wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> having more places to walk, bike, and explore that aren’t just cookie-cutter boilerplate-esque suburbs and freeways would be really nice. We're at a critical juncture here in the Twin Cities. The state DOT needs to re-build the interstate that cuts right through the entire metro area (I-94) for the first time since it was first built 50 years ago. There is a serious proposal to remove the interstate entirely and re…

> There is a serious proposal to remove the interstate entirely and replace it with a street. I'm afraid that this would wind up like Vancouver, which lacks freeways through the city and has pretty bad traffic as a result. Better maybe to tunnel it under if possible? That works well for Seattle, although we still have I5 to contend with that divides the downtown from Capitol Hill (there is talk of lidding the entire…

All cities will forever have "bad traffic". Car transport capacity is plain abysmal.

Re: Tear up unused parking lots, plant trees

#82

Post by nradov »

apendleton wrote: post #69
travoc wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Parking minimums are required by cities because underparked development projects dump their parking problems on the surrounding neighborhoods. These types of externalities shouldn't just be hand-waved away in the name of "urbanization." The lack of parking creates real problems for residents, police and businesses in growing cities every day.

This is solvable with parking permit programs. Make street parking in those surrounding neighborhoods resident-only. And then people considering living in the "underparked" neighborhood who need parking will have no alternative but to select units that include parking, or live in another neighborhood (and if enough people opt not to live there, developers will include more parking to satisfy demand). This is a proble…

Where do guests park when they come to visit?

Re: Tear up unused parking lots, plant trees

#83

Post by fasthands9 »

wtp1saac wrote: post #4

Strong Towns has called a good amount of attention to the mandatory parking requirements in many cities (and shockingly, many downtowns). Thankfully, it seems a fair number of cities are removing such restrictions, but hopefully it becomes more widespread. In general I hope the US can urbanize, the older I get the more I realize it’s not really enjoyable living in this country. I don’t think I want hyper dense, but h…

The problem I have with the thinking in this article most of the parking lots are privately owned so saying 'tear them up and plant trees' is not something that can be implemented by the government.

If mandatory parking requirements did go down, and zoning was increased, then the people who own it would willingly put forth the effort to make the space more useful. It would also help sort out what is considered "unused" - which right now is a nebulous concept.

Re: Tear up unused parking lots, plant trees

#84

Post by yCombLinks »

matsemann wrote: post #52
verve_rat wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>A car centric life is not sustainable for the planet. How so? If we waved a magic wand and all cars became EVs powered by renewable energy, what would be unsustainable?

We have mostly EVs sold in Norway the last few years. It's not been so great: https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/23939076/norway-electric-...

The problems in this article seem to all stem from excessive subsidies for EVs causing cars to become more widespread. That's far different than in the US where cars already dominate all infrastructure. Here, a transition from ICE to EVs would be way better and more realistic.

Re: Tear up unused parking lots, plant trees

#85

Post by juujian »

fasthands9 wrote: post #83
wtp1saac wrote: post #4

Strong Towns has called a good amount of attention to the mandatory parking requirements in many cities (and shockingly, many downtowns). Thankfully, it seems a fair number of cities are removing such restrictions, but hopefully it becomes more widespread. In general I hope the US can urbanize, the older I get the more I realize it’s not really enjoyable living in this country. I don’t think I want hyper dense, but h…

The problem I have with the thinking in this article most of the parking lots are privately owned so saying 'tear them up and plant trees' is not something that can be implemented by the government. If mandatory parking requirements did go down, and zoning was increased, then the people who own it would willingly put forth the effort to make the space more useful. It would also help sort out what is considered "unuse…

It's easy, just charge all property owners for sales surface area. It messes with lots of things, water table, flooding, generates heat. All things that create cost for a community. That's how Berlin decided to tackle the issue.

Re: Tear up unused parking lots, plant trees

#86

Post by nerdbert »

whydoyoucare wrote: post #75
an_ko wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Major European cities with no such minimum parking requirements do fine. They have public transport and bike infrastructure, so many people in dense urban areas don't need cars.

I bet no one in major European cities requires to bike like ten miles each way. The point is the size of American cities is vastly different to European ones, so what works that side of Atlantic rarely translates "as-is" here. (I am disappointed about this oft thrown around comparison, since my city reduced one lane on several major roads and created bike paths. Sadly, we now have major traffic jams and hardly any ut…

> I bet no one in major European cities requires to bike like ten miles each way.

I am in Amsterdam, and lots of people bike 15km each way, including many students at the high schools my children attend.

Re: Tear up unused parking lots, plant trees

#87

Post by _whiteCaps_ »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #79
coldpie wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> having more places to walk, bike, and explore that aren’t just cookie-cutter boilerplate-esque suburbs and freeways would be really nice. We're at a critical juncture here in the Twin Cities. The state DOT needs to re-build the interstate that cuts right through the entire metro area (I-94) for the first time since it was first built 50 years ago. There is a serious proposal to remove the interstate entirely and re…

> There is a serious proposal to remove the interstate entirely and replace it with a street. I'm afraid that this would wind up like Vancouver, which lacks freeways through the city and has pretty bad traffic as a result. Better maybe to tunnel it under if possible? That works well for Seattle, although we still have I5 to contend with that divides the downtown from Capitol Hill (there is talk of lidding the entire…

I love that Vancouver doesn't have a freeway through the city - but they've also got a relatively good transit system. IIRC it's the equivalent of 26 lanes for cars.

Re: Tear up unused parking lots, plant trees

#88

Post by mkoubaa »

ericcumbee wrote: post #33
osigurdson wrote: post #13

You could always put together a group and purchase the land from the current owners. Once you take possession, put the land in trust, tear it up and plant trees. You could potentially recover some costs by donating to the city but there is always a chance that they would decide to change the zoning in the future.

unless they have a purpose in mind for said property, a lot of cities are hesitant to do that. because it takes the property off the tax roll when the city accepts it.

Yes but property values near greenery and parks are theoretically higher, right? At least in some places. It could also be beneficial for water runoff management and flood resistance to have more trees

Re: Tear up unused parking lots, plant trees

#89

Post by mkoubaa »

housebear wrote: post #70

Does anyone have an idea of what it would roughly cost to purchase an unused parking lot, tear it up, dispose of the asphalt waste, re-soil, and plant 30 or so trees? Is this something some enterprising person could start a kickstarter for just as a public experiment? Is it even possible with zoning requirements or the like?

In time or money? You can cancel your gym membership and work on it an hour a day

Re: Tear up unused parking lots, plant trees

#90

Post by hobs »

coldpie wrote: post #74
hobs wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in the twin cities and I had no idea that was even on anyone's mind, I love the idea.

Please, please (please) contact everyone you can think of to support the idea. MnDOT has contact info on the Rethinking I-94 page[1], tell your city council rep, your county commissioner, your mayor, your state legislators, the governor. Tell your friends and neighbors. It's so easy to just fall back and do the same thing we've always done; making a change is really hard and we need to show that there is support for…

I will do this thing you say.
Post reply on HN