The city of Columbus, OH, is reducing the number of parking spaces required for businesses in its downtown area. It's a beginning but Don Shoup recommends that parking requirements be done away with completely. If you want some background, read this from the LA Business Journal by a developer and how parking requirements affected his business The argument goes like this.
Parking requirements are usually based on "Silly" numbers that have little basis in reality. IE Nunnery – 1 space per every three nuns; Swimming pool – 1 space for each 15,000 gallons of water; Beauty Shop – 1 space for every station; Adult Book Store – 1 space for every 1000 square feet – The point is that none of these absolute requirements, and most others, hold up well to close scrutiny. The result is that when a business wants open in an area and if the business it is replacing doesn't meet the parking requirement, urban renewal simply won't happen. If I want to put a restaurant where a hardware store used to be, I should be able to do so. The business risk is mine. They don't build churches for Easter and Christmas, and we shouldn't require parking for the Day after Thanksgiving. Columbus has made a good start, but simply reducing the requirements by 20% helps, but it doesn't solve the problem.
I know it's difficult for "planners" to get their minds around the concept of "unplanned" parking requirements, but in most cases parking is overbuilt. And if it's not, people and the free market will fix the problem. Some will decide to ride the bus, carpool, or move to the area, assuming its attractive, so they don't need a car. Urban density is seen as a good thing. One way to get it is to let the parking requirements go the way of the dodo bird.
JVH
2 Responses
One trip to Mumbai, Dehli, Abu Dhabi, Dubai, or Mexico City ought to cure anyone of the “free market” approach to parking requirements for real estate developers. These cities demonstrate that 9 out of 10 developers will cut corners on parking to save themselves time, space, and money. Yet, it is a proven fact that new development means more cars will come into an area. If developers do not provide ample parking spaces to meet the increase demand generated by their projects then cars will circle around looking for parking space which increases traffic and noise & air pollution.
The reason all of these developing nations are adopting strict parking requirements for developers is that they are sick and tired of the pollution, blaring horns, short tempers, and endless time spent circling around looking for parking spaces. After spending a lot of time in these cities, I am very glad they came to their senses and starting mandating parking as a part of their real estate development approvals. Why in God’s name would we want to repeat their mistakes?
Your examples of linking parking spaces to gallons of water are funny, but they distract the reader from the fact that most requirements are directly linked to very relevant metrics such as number of bedrooms, seats for restaurant patrons, or sq ft. of rentable office space. I understand all too well that this is more difficult in tight urban re-development projects (after all, fitting cars in tight spaces is our business). While it used to be more difficult to fit the cars, there are many new technologies from SMS-enabled valet operations to mechanical stackers and fully automated systems like ours, that make it cost effective to achieve greater vehicle density.
Like it or not, parking is a basic infrastructure element that a developer must factor into their business model. If the project cannot support adequate parking, then it probably should not get built until some more creative developer finds a use for that land that will support the parking requirement. If Enron and this sub-prime meltdown have taught us anything, its that “free markets” work best when they have some boundaries within which to operate. Parking requirements are one of those boundaries in the real estate development game.
I have been looking into parking policy around Asia. A report on it should be out next month (with luck).
It is true that Mumbai and Delhi have parking chaos and are now trying to follow the conventional suburban parking policy approach of minimum parking requirements with buildings. Dhaka, with car ownership below 50 per 1000 people, is doing the same. In a situation like that, is it really a good idea to force building managers and all of their customers to subsidize the parking of the tiny elite? So far, it is not working very well (see http://reinventingtransport.blogspot.com/2010/04/parking-dramas-in-south-asian-cities.html). Off-street parking does not magically suck cars off the streets if the streets are easy and cheap to park in.
By contrast, Japanese cities mostly have rather low parking requirements (typically one parking space per 150 to 400 square metres of floor space). And Japanese parking requirements ONLY apply to large buildings. Modest-sized buildings (below about 1500 to 2000 square metres of floor space) usually have no parking required. The full requirements only apply above 6000 sq.m. (they phase in between 2000 and 6000 sq.m).
Yet Japanese cities don’t have parking chaos. In fact, they have very little on-street parking. And since 2006 on-street parking rules are quite strictly enforced. Where do people park then? (they are not ALL using the trains or bicycles). Answer: spillover parking goes mostly into commercial off-street parking, which seems to be ubiquitous. (and some city-owned parking lots, usually underground).
The Japanese parking arrangements are not perfect but maybe they point towards a workable solution that is akin to John’s (and Donald Shoup’s) market-oriented one. At least it suggests that high parking standards are not necessary to avoid parking chaos.