How Free Is Your Parking?
Fri, 11/06/2009 - 10:57am | by mides
There is no such thing as a free lunch, and there is no such thing as free parking. Providing parking requires land, and land requires revenue to pay for its rent. Basic economic theory would have developers providing parking up to the point where revenue raised by last the car park equals the value of the next best land use alternative.
Minimum Parking Requirements (MPRs), by definition, force developers to provide parking above this economically efficient level, which raises development costs, subsidizes private automobile transport over other modes such as walking, cycling and public transport, and provides incentives to develop at low densities, encouraging sprawl.
Comments
I...honestly don't know what
I...honestly don't know what is with the several pro-developer, anti-parking posts on this site lately.
The website address is "tcstreetsforpeople.org". Perhaps a change to "tcstreetsfordevelopers.org" would be more appropriate?
Certainly there is no mention of bike parking in this post. No mention of sidewalks. No mention of more pedestrian friendly space. No mention of adding public transit.
If anything, I'm for the opposite - if we're not going to advocate for more streets-for-people items, then we should be insisting on *more* parking spaces, preferably directly in front of the business as a buffer to the street.
Looking towards the future, it's next to impossible to get anyone to tear down buildings in a line to make a street bigger. But it's much easier (relative to tearing down buildings, at least) to get those parking spaces converted, at some point, to bike lanes, separated bike boulevards, light rail, separated pedestrian space, etc.
So I'm all for more parking, preferably right in front of businesses as a buffer to the street, so that at some point we might have some chance of using that space for bikes and peds.
Also, the entire reason there are parking regulations is because of exactly what you stated - "Basic economic theory would have developers providing parking up to the point where revenue raised by last the car park equals the value of the next best land use alternative". That is exactly what developers do. For cheaper property, developers prefer to provide no parking whatsoever, leaving people circling the block 5 times trying to find an empty spot on the street. More street parking does not help those of us on bikes - it means worse visibility around corners and the getting doored. For more expensive property, developers know people won't rent or buy without a parking space for their car, so they build the bare minimum amount of parking needed for the residents (how many times have you been told that it's a 2 bedroom apartment, but there's only 1 parking spot??). They don't care about congestion, or whether people visiting have parking spaces. They don't care that it makes biking on those streets, if there's a lot of traffic, more difficult. Because they can cash out in exactly the manner you describe - one condo takes up what, 4 parking spaces? Say it's a 3 level building, and condos are $150,000 a piece. That's a $200,000 parking space each. Let's say you can fit 6 bikes into 1 parking space. Do you think they're going to build a 6 bike parking space when they can make $200,000 instead? Heck no.
Having space for people doesn't mean cramming as many buildings in as you possibly can in a small amount of space. People need to get in and out of these spaces, and replacing parking with development isn't going to help that happen, it's going to make it worse.
Missing the point
I think you are missing the point. These posts about parking are not pro-development and should not be seen as such. They are simply meant to get people to see a different approach to how we currently use parking spaces and how that can change in the future.
Sometimes when you post
Sometimes when you post something online that's a straightforward question, it accidentally gets interpreted as having a snarky or heavily sarcastic tone to it. I say that because my question is fairly straightforward, and I'm not trying to be a smartass with it - at least this time -
What part of this post explains a different approach to how we currently use parking spaces? I just see a point that parking isn't free, and that it costs developers money because it uses space the developers could otherwise develop more buildings on. That's...it.
I'm really trying to ask an actual, logical question here. If this wasn't a "Parking is evil. Eviiiiiiil I say!"post...perhaps a more defined conclusion would make it clearer?
developers don't pay for parking
I didn’t read the original post as pro-developer. Developers don’t pay for parking, home owners (and renters) pay for parking. When zoning codes require parking, often at 1 or 2 parking spaces per dwelling unit, they are requiring all home owners in a building to purchase parking that they may or may not use.
Unbundled parking, which has been used in some developments here (I know it was used in Midtown Lofts on the Greenway in Minneapolis), allows consumers to choose how much parking they need and how much they want to pay for. Homeowners with two cars can purchase two parking spaces, those with one car can buy one parking space, and people who don’t own a car don’t pay for parking. This could be made even more financially attractive for homeowners or renters if the building included car-sharing, which would allow many households to share the same vehicle, reducing the need for each person to pay separately for the vehicle, gas, insurance, and that parking space.
Reducing parking mimimums or establishing maximums does the same thing but on a more macro level – it creates more housing choices for people. Why should I pay for 2 parking spaces when I don’t own a car? If we’re talking about structured parking in a condo or apartment building, that’s probably an additional $60,000 onto the price of my home.
How is any of this related to “streets for people?” Part of the vision of streets for people is that car use is one of many transportation choices available to people. Parking requirements mean homeowners are required to pay for extremely expensive parking even if they choose not to own a car (or two cars). This raises the cost of home ownership, and makes housing more expensive than it needs to be, often in the most walkable, bikable, and transit-rich parts of our communities. It is particularly counter-intuitive to require high parking ratios in areas of the cities where it is easiest to get around without a car, because that is precisely where people who want to make the choice to walk, bike or take transit will likely find it most desirable to live.
more parking links
Salon.com article on the pervasive cost of parking spots in US cities -- http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2007/10/01/parking/index1.html
Report on the overall federal subsidy going to parking spots --
http://www.streetsblog.org/2009/09/29/new-report-feds-subsidizing-parking-six-times-as-much-as-transit/
Article on the parking reform movement in the US, making the costs of parking more equitable and socially just --
http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/010266.html
I'll add one more
The cost of housing and its relationship to walkability:
http://www.smartcityradio.com/show/2585/walking-the-walk
Actually, I liked this bit
Actually, I liked this bit from the comments on one of those articles -
"Would you also advocate removing the subsidies paid to public transit systems? As far as I know, outside Japan, almost *no* public transit systems cover their costs with revenue from fares. We should raise the cost of bus and train fare by 2-5x so that people not using public transit aren't required to subsidize those who do, if we're doing the same thing with parking."
$2.50 gas tax
In an ideal world the gas tax would be at least $2.50, and the only on-street parking spaces would be priced at-cost. In an ideal world the transit fare would quadruple so that fareboxes would cover operating and capital costs. In an ideal world there would be a special sales tax on bikes and bike parts to cover capital and maintenance costs for bike facilities. The legislature would constantly field proposals for Tennis Shoe Registration Fees to cover the costs of sidewalks. In that ideal world, then, no residential building would be less than six stories high because no one would want to live outside of walking distance from the city center.