Learning to "despise parking lots like the good-for-nothing, colossal wastes of space they are."

All that empty, unused space.

The Revenge of the Parking Lot, by Neal Freyman (Morning Brew)

Before I wrote for the Brew, I worked in urban planning. And if I learned one thing, it was to despise parking lots like the good-for-nothing, colossal wastes of space they are.

But times are changing. In the Coronavirus Age, parking lots are winning the heart and mind of at least one jaded American for (finally) putting their asphalt to good use.

First, though, we should establish something

Parking lots are indeed good-for-nothing, colossal wastes of space. I take my cue from the parking lot’s #1 enemy, Dr. Donald Shoup, a UCLA professor who’s famous for writing a 741-page tome called The High Cost of Free Parking. In the book, Shoup rails against “parking requirements,” which are laws requiring developers to add a minimum number of off-street parking spaces to new buildings.

99% of you will not read this book, so I’ll just summarize his main points:

• When you park for free at a mall or restaurant, you aren’t really parking for “free.” Parking requirements mandated by the city of Los Angeles increased the cost of building a shopping center by 67%–93%, according to a study cited by Shoup. Those costs are passed down from retailers to you, the consumer.
• The same thing happens in housing. When residential developers are required to add a certain number of parking spots to a new housing complex, they pass those construction costs down to you, the apartment renter.
• Not to mention, parking lots increase traffic congestion, exacerbate climate change, prevent walkability, and...did I mention they’re good-for-nothing, colossal wastes of space? A 2015 study found that 14% of all incorporated land in Los Angeles County is dedicated to parking.

Redemption

One of the ways COVID-19 has turned our world upside down is that park

ing lots, with their uncanny ability to accommodate social distancing, have made themselves useful ...

How do minimum parking requirements factor into New Albany's forthcoming updated zoning ordinance?

The argument against minimum parking requirements is not new. Donald Shoup was talking about it in 1999.

Urban planners typically set the minimum parking requirements for every land use to satisfy the peakdemand for free parking. As a result, parking is free for 99% of automobile trips in the United States. Minimum parking requirements increase the supply and reduce the price -- but not the cost -- of parking. They bundle the cost of parking spaces into the cost of development, and thereby increase the prices of all the goods and services sold at the sites that offer free parking. Cars have many external costs, but the external cost of parking in cities may be greater than all the other external costs combined. To prevent spillover, cities could price on-street parking rather than require off-street parking. Compared with minimum parking requirements, market prices can allocate parking spaces fairly and efficiently.

Strong Towns takes a strong stance on the matter.

End Parking Minimums: Waste of money. Waste of space.

It's time to put an end to parking minimum laws and allow our cities to become productive places again.

What's wrong with parking minimums?
Strong Towns allow new businesses to flourish and treat their land as a valuable resource. Minimum parking requirements hinder the potential of Strong Towns by creating barriers for new local business start ups, and filling our cities with unproductive, empty parking spaces that don’t add value to our places.

Join us each November for our annual #BlackFridayParking event, which takes a bold stand against parking minimums with an interactive, nationwide campaign.

Want to see an end to parking minimums across America? Join the movement that's working to accomplish that.

There's a resource page with links to numerous articles about the usefulness of removing parking minimums. Here's one:

What makes surface parking so destructive is that it consumes a finite resource (land) with virtually no direct financial benefit. Our pre-occupation at Urban Three is local finance. From that perspective, parking — in particular the vast kind that adorns strip malls and box stores — is dead weight. Local governments, be they in cities, towns, or counties, are all constrained by the land they can develop. What they do with that resource is thus, paramount to how well they can pay their bills. Tax revenue is but one of many resources squandered by each acre of land devoted to deactivated cars.

Here's another:

Parking minimums are the strange, out-dated, and totally unscientific law that's probably languishing in your city's zoning code. They sound dull (and they are) but they're incredibly important because they have dramatically shaped our cities in a detrimental manner.

Today, I'm explaining exactly why these laws are harmful and what you can do about them.

1. They rob us of financial productivity and prosperity.
2. They hinder small business owners, homeowners, developers and renters.
3. They fill our cities with empty, useless space.

Now I'm just piling on:

One Line of Your Zoning Code Can Make a World of Difference, by Aaron Qualls

Aaron Qualls is the Director of Planning & Community Development for the city of Sandpoint, Idaho. He shared this essay with us about the benefits Sandpoint has seen in the ten years since it removed all minimum parking requirements in its downtown, and we’re pleased to share it with you.

In 2009, as buildings were being bulldozed for surface parking to meet minimum standards in Historic Downtown Sandpoint, Idaho, city leadership took bold action. Downtown area off-street parking requirements were completely eliminated. The decision was preceded by heated debate and was not unanimous. Now, ten years later, what was the result?

Since that contentious decision by the Sandpoint City Council, millions have been invested downtown—projects that would not have been feasible, but for the elimination of parking requirements. Several jobs, building renovations, and expansions by local businesses were essentially made possible by adding a single line of code.

Arguably, no city ordinance is more underestimated for its long term impacts than off-street parking requirements. Many cities are now starting to recognize the negative effects parking minimums can have on housing affordability, historic preservation, the environment, small businesses, walkability and municipal budgets ...

The city of New Albany's staffers have been working for perhaps two years with an outfit called 11th Street to rewrite our code of ordinances. I took a glance at a draft copy from last year and found this, which comes at the end of 5-10 pages of explanation about newly revised ... minimum parking requirements.

I've written to several appointed and elected officials in New Albany seeking clarification as to why in an era of disappearing minimum parking requirements, we seem to be doubling down -- BUT I'm the first to admit the planning/zoning muck-speak is such that I may be completely misinterpreting this section.

If any of them reply, I'll let you know.

Related:

A rant about the fundamentals of parking space economics.

What's a Parking Benefits District? DNA needs to pay more attention to matters that pertain to merchants.

"Why free parking is bad for everyone."

Parking the car when it's not moving, "which, these days, is about 95% of the time."

A long, leisurely Saturday morning read.

Parkageddon: How not to create traffic jams, pollution and urban sprawl (The Economist)

Don’t let people park for free

EVEN if the new headquarters that Apple is creating in California does not prove to be “the best office building in the world”, as Steve Jobs boasted shortly before his death in 2011, it will be an astounding sight. The main building resembles a flying saucer with a hole in the middle. Through its large, gently curving windows, workers will eventually look out on a wood containing some 7,000 carefully chosen trees. It is as though a race of high-tech beings has landed on a pristine planet.

And then, unfortunately, there’s the car park. For 14,000 workers, Apple is building almost 11,000 parking spaces. Many cars will be tucked under the main building, but most will cram into two enormous garages to the south. Tot up all the parking spaces and the lanes and ramps that will allow cars to reach them, and it is clear that Apple is allocating a vast area to stationary vehicles. In all, the new headquarters will contain 318,000 square metres of offices and laboratories. The car parks will occupy 325,000 square metres.

Apple is building 11,000 parking spaces not because it wants to but because Cupertino, the suburban city where the new headquarters is located, demands it.

A rant about the fundamentals of parking space economics.

Areas colored red are without buildings, potentially available for parking. 

As noted yesterday ...

It's coming around again, folks: What about downtown parking problems and/or solutions?

I glanced around the web in search of an article that might help us understand the issues involved with parking, which in the ideal world should involve first being able to diagnose the problem, and only then to apply solutions. There are many such articles, but this one gets us started.

Don’t be Misled by Parking Space Economics, by Bill Lindeke (Streets MN; 02/26/2013).

Lindeke speaks of St. Paul, Minnesota, but the fundamentals also reference New Albany, Indiana. Specifically, the author is pulling data from Donald Shoup's seminal book, The High Cost of Free Parking, which has been spoken of at NAC on numerous occasions.

Lindeke begins with your innermost needs:

People driving around looking for parking is second only to sex when it comes to tapping into our lizard brain, our deepest core of animal urges. Parking drives people to madness, making them do crazy things, losing themselves in some sort of green Hulk rage of parallel lines and proximity.

In fact, in his book Shoup points to psychological research to show how we understand parking through almost mystical lenses, as if we are “predators” governed by “parking karma.” He writes:

Thinking about parking seems to take place in the reptilian cortex… said to govern instinctive behavior involved in aggression, dominance, territoriality, and ritual display – all important factors in cruising for parking and debating about parking policies.

Reptilian or not, parking comes down to something that has intrinsic value (a place to put one's car for a limited amount of time), a value not reflected by the space being "free" -- because "free" doesn't exist. Never has, never will. The worst use of a parking space on the street in front of a business is for it to be widely regarded as free. What's more, those spaces are not the exclusive domain of the business owner.

Rather, they're part of a whole, and must be viewed this way.

The entire parking ecosystem of downtown ... is one large market, and the city as a whole is worth a certain amount per year. The value of each parking space is directly related to the value of every other, and we need to figure out ways to get the most value out of each of them.

Again: What is the value of parking spaces, and how best to leverage that value to the benefit of everyone downtown, not one or a only a few?

As long as we keep on-street parking free or absurdly cheap, almost everyone is going to be pissed off about it. That problem will never disappear, no matter how much paradise you pave. But if you get the prices right, parking problems will melt away.

Lindeke's example is of topical significance here in New Albany. Note that we have no parking meters in New Albany, but the result is the same.

Should you be lucky and get one of these “free” spots, you will stay parked there as long as possible. Shoup gives the example of employees at a restaurant that might grab a key on-street space right when meters expire (sometimes 5:00 or 6:00 PM around here). They’ll stay in that spot all evening because it’s free, while potential restaurant patrons may have difficulty finding parking.

Shoup argues that on-street parking should be more expensive than its off-street garage and ramp competition, so that those key spots turn over faster, while the less-convenient off-street or out-of-the-way spots are used by those who intend to remain parked for longer periods of time.

And another added point:

In the first case, making on-street parking practically free (compared to off-street garages) means that many drivers will “cruise” for spots, instead of paying more to use expensive ramps.

But in New Albany, our "ramps" are not expensive. In fact, the parking garage we have at the corner of State and Market, within a few minutes walk of 90% of downtown shops, offices and eateries, is ludicrously cheap or even available at no charge during peak periods.

(Yes, this represents a governmental subsidy; those spaces still are not "free")

Why isn't every employee (and owner) of downtown businesses using the parking garage, especially during the evenings? It's so obvious that even Bob Caesar understood it, and used the garage this way during his time of business ownership.

For many years, I've faulted City Hall (all of them) for declaring downtown an enforcement-free zone, and abdicating leadership on this issue. Yes, at times there needs to be a referee, and if this isn't municipal governments's job, I don't know what is.

But -- and this is a huge one -- downtown merchants, business owners and stakeholders in a collective sense have refused to (a) educate themselves about parking, and (b) use this knowledge as a unified front to make a proposal to City Hall.

In effect, Doug England threw it at the feet of downtown stakeholders: "Here you go. Upset because we're marking tires and collecting fines? Okay, now it's open season. No rules at all. Whatcha going to do to help yourselves?"

The answer has been nothing. Sorry  if it offends you. It's true. These are small, independent business operators. I've been one, and I love them all to death, and their best hope in a jigged system is to embrace information and act for the empowerment of all, not just one. Parking is precisely such an information-driven subject. However, we must absorb it and be prepared to act on it.

Speaking personally, a status quo of  nothingness works fine for me, as I'm no longer involved with a particular business, and I do what the rest of you should be doing, which is finding alternative means of transport.

In short, I walk. I've planned my life this way, so I could walk, and I do so. It would be helpful to the parking discussion (and to the community's future prospects) if New Albany's streets and sidewalks were actually safe for walking and biking, but that's a different discussion and another set of principles to be understood.

So, let's reiterate: There is no such thing as "free" parking, whether on the street or at the parking garage. Values must be determined, and strategies to reinforce value devised. Business owners need to take responsibility for this knowledge. Government needs to enforce norms. And, if a handful of customers decide that they like suburban strip malls better than what is offered downtown, that's fine. It's their choice. Others will take their place.

Confidence and knowledge, people. It's not radicalism, just calculated collective self-interest.

"Minneapolis has a surprisingly simple plan to cut traffic and make housing more affordable."

It's my firm belief that business owners in downtown New Albany would benefit more from exploring territories lying outside the usual boxes, with parking policies being an excellent case in point, than continuing the traditional and largely failed pattern of trusting City Hall to do their thinking for them.

"Why free parking is bad for everyone" at NAC (June, 2014)

... To cities where he serves as a parking consultant, Shoup's recommendation is simple. "Charge the right price for on-street parking," he says. "I see this as the lowest price you can charge and still have one or two open spaces per block." This means the market sets the price — and people are paying as little as possible for parking without creating the cruising problem.

Each day, the city enforces parking ordinances outside of downtown but not in the historic business district, apparently from a misguided belief that "free" parking is necessary for independent small business advancement. It's simply poisonous to arbitrarily enforce one set of laws and not another, especially when the premise of parking as being valueless is what prefaces many of the current problems with abuse.

A second article explores reasons why parking space requirements negatively impact affordable housing.

Minneapolis has a surprisingly simple plan to cut traffic and make housing more affordable, by Joseph Stromberg (Vox)

 ... "The worst thing that many American cities have done, for low-income people, is create a world in which you need a car," retired UCLA economist Donald Shoup told me in an interview last year. "Parking pushes everything farther apart, and even if you're too poor to own a car, you have to pay for all the free parking you don't use."

"Why free parking is bad for everyone."

Parking's never an issue when you do it on the sidewalk.

Read it first.

THEN start spluttering like an enraged old white man.

Why free parking is bad for everyone, by Joseph Stromberg (Vox)

America is built around cars. And most of us expect that we'll be able to park our cars for free, pretty much anywhere we go.

But economist Donald Shoup of UCLA has made a name for himself by advocating an alternative scheme: charging for street parking anywhere there are more people with cars than spaces to park.

Shoup's 2005 book, The High Cost of Free Parking, articulated why exactly he thinks free parking is such a bad idea. His ideas have started to influence policy: several cities, including San Francisco, have recently begun experimenting with the variable, market-set pricing scheme he thinks makes the most sense. And recent studies have confirmed that it cuts down on cruising time and traffic congestion.