Fascinating article. Requiring parking spaces for apartment buildings in dense areas near the Red and Purple Lines really is ridiculous.

by Ronit on Mar 21, 2013 12:59 pm • link • report

Just for clarity: off-street parking, which is usually required in non-downtown areas with larger lots, go to waste during the day even though those ares have plenty of street parking anyways? Huh?

Otherwise I see the gist of the article. I would say that I think it's reasonable to require off-street parking for single-family homes (attached and detached) and similar near Metro because there's a good chance those folks are going to take Metro for commuting and leave their vehicle at home.

by Fitz on Mar 21, 2013 1:09 pm • link • report

The trashcan lying thoughtlessly on the ground is a nice touch.

by Frank IBC on Mar 21, 2013 1:12 pm • link • report

I as someone who agrees that in some cases there is too much parking, have to make the argument from the perspective of someone who lives less than half a mile from a metro station, in an apartment building, with a car parked in that buildings parking lot.

I can actually walk to work, and because i'm so close to transit, often use Metro or Metro Bus in the evenings and weekends, but also usually about once a week am going somewhere where I take my car with me. The car is paid off, and insurance is low, so I'm not going to get rid of it. If parking were not available, or were only available at an extreme premium (higher than the current charges already are), i'd just not live in the area and drive to work every day. Now you're reducing demand of apartments near Metro simply because you're suggesting I can't live near the Metro and expect to own a car.

Take the argument into the suburbs, and the issue becomes the same i've had when I lived in city row home neighborhoods. If I get home with my car in the middle of the day Saturday, or before 6pm on a weekday I may find parking, but come home late, and you circle the block for what can be 20 minutes, and many blocks away from home, looking for parking, often because someone on the block is having guests over, otherwise parking in "my" spot. Now it's a public street, there is no such thing as "my" spot, so to address this common complaint, code requires I provide a spot on "my" property. This is even MORE important if you're not near transit, because almost everyone will need a car to run errands and get to work, and many households are multi-car households.

The places I have the biggest problem with parking minimums is commercial, especially retail, but includes office also. I've almost never seen a commercial property where there was excess parking, and almost always see places with 2x more parking than needed. That's not to say the front door of a mall or office may seem crowded, or the 'main street' of one of those new fangled shopping centers sans roof may be impossible to park on, but there is always some big side parking lot somewhere, almost always empty. When we're adding 50 spaces in a side parking lot just to 'meet code' but it's somewhere that no one will realistically use, that's what is wasteful.

by Gull on Mar 21, 2013 1:48 pm • link • report

Gull,

If parking were not available...

No one is suggesting that we get rid of parking. The suggestion is that we get rid of minimum on-site parking requirements.

Now it's a public street, there is no such thing as "my" spot, so to address this common complaint, code requires I provide a spot on "my" property.

Again, if you have a problem managing on-street parking, the zoning code is a very poor tool to do so.

If the parking is a) important, and b) easy to provide, the market will provide it! A rigid code, however, does not actually address the core issue of spillover parking, nor does it provide flexibility in solving that problem.

This is even MORE important if you're not near transit, because almost everyone will need a car to run errands and get to work, and many households are multi-car households.

This is not a valid assumption.

by Alex B. on Mar 21, 2013 1:54 pm • link • report

I have to agree that using zoning is a horrible way to manage parking. Every argument that I have seen or heard about the minimums revolve around on-street parking, but few want to really address that problem.

by Thad on Mar 21, 2013 2:08 pm • link • report

New houses must have 2 spaces, even in areas zoned for ½-acre house lots where there is always plenty of space on the street.

Maybe there is plenty of space on the street because of the off-street parking minimum. How much on-street space do you suppose would be available if all the cars that occupied off-street spaces were moved into street spaces?

Each driveway denies the public a parking space

That's not really true, as each driveway provides access to at least one, and usually more than one, off-street space.

by Scoot on Mar 21, 2013 2:11 pm • link • report

Maybe there is plenty of space on the street because of the off-street parking minimum.

Maybe, but not likely. With minimum 1/2 acre lots, let's say you've got a lot that is an exact square.

43560 sf per acre, so a lot of 21780 sf (if a perfect square) would be approx 147 x 147. Assume one of those sides fronts on the street, and you've got 147 linear feet on on-street parking. Estimate that at 20 feet per space, and you've got 7 parking spaces there on street.

So, we can round down to 5 on-street spaces per lot. Zoning requires less than 5 spaces per house (zoning requires 2), ergo, the parking demand could be met solely via on-street parking.

That's not really true, as each driveway provides access to at least one, and usually more than one, off-street space.

It is true. The public can't just park in someone's private driveway. Nor can they park in front of that driveway to block it. That curb cut could be used for public on-street parking.

The extreme case is small, narrow houses with garages. You can see this in San Francisco, where curb cuts dominate a block so as to remove all public parking on the street. Except you don't gain any total parking, since those curb cuts only access private garages:

http://transbay.files.wordpress.com/2010/02/nb_garage1.jpg?w=750

http://sf.streetsblog.org/wp-content/uploads/gaven_street_no_parking.jpg

by Alex B. on Mar 21, 2013 2:21 pm • link • report

Each driveway denies the public a parking space

That's not really true, as each driveway provides access to at least one, and usually more than one, off-street space.

Actually, that statement is true, because a member of the public is not going to park in your (or my) driveway, but they could park in the space taken up by the entrance to the driveway.

by Thad on Mar 21, 2013 2:32 pm • link • report

@ Alex B. - Locally, this same situation occurs on several streets in Old Town Alexandria, where the space between curb cuts is not long enough to park a car and so entire blocks are off-limits for on-street parking because of garage entrances.

by Thad on Mar 21, 2013 2:34 pm • link • report

So, we can round down to 5 on-street spaces per lot. Zoning requires less than 5 spaces per house (zoning requires 2), ergo, the parking demand could be met solely via on-street parking.

This is a fairly easy calculation: If the sum of cars currently parked on the street plus cars that park off-street exceeds the total number of cars that could park on the street, then the demand could not be met by eliminating all the off-street spaces.

It is true. The public can't just park in someone's private driveway.

Usually, each space restricted by a driveway and thereby "denied" to the public frees up at least one on-street space, as parked cars are moved off the street and onto private property. In the case of driveways that provide access to multiple off-street spaces, the street effectively gains multiple street spaces for every space lost to a driveway.

I don't support designing lots where garages are so close to each other that they effectively disable parking on the entire block (as you have shown), but while these configurations provide a dramatic backdrop by which to discuss parking, they are somewhat abnormal in this region.

by Scoot on Mar 21, 2013 3:13 pm • link • report

@ Scoot - Two points about private driveways:

1) I have lived in houses both without and with a driveway in similar neighborhoods in Alexandria. The difference is that with a driveway, I am ALWAYS denying my neighbors a parking space by the presence of my curb cut. It doesn't matter how many spaces I have on my property, my curb cut has reduced the number of PUBLIC spaces available.

2) The presence of a driveway does not mean that it is used to park the owner's vehicles. In the curve of road that I currently live, 5 of 7 houses with driveways park cars on the road instead of utilizing space in their driveways. (And, I am not including one neighbor that has too many vehicles for their driveway.)

by Thad on Mar 21, 2013 3:31 pm • link • report

I am ALWAYS denying my neighbors a parking space by the presence of my curb cut.

Are you talking about driveways where curb cuts are so close together that they effectively prohibit parking between driveways? Because on a typical street in a suburb, such as that which is pictured in the blog piece above, the driveway only denies drivers a parking space at the location of the driveway. The fact that the driveway provides access to an off-street space frees up another space on the street for others to park.

5 of 7 houses with driveways park cars on the road instead of utilizing space in their driveways.

As of right now, there is no law that prohibits people who own driveways from parking their cars on the street. If the curve of the road where you currently live suffers from too much demand for parking and not enough supply, maybe you could speak to your civic association about encouraging people to utilize their driveways.

by Scoot on Mar 21, 2013 3:47 pm • link • report

@Thad: Echoing your point, this seems particularly bad the way MoCo does it. In my East SS neighborhood, I automatically qualify for on-street parking stickers for up to two cars, plus one for visitors (for some tiny fee like $15 a year). This despite my driveway, which is already removing plenty of space from on-street parking.

by Gray on Mar 21, 2013 3:51 pm • link • report

@Scoot: The point, which I agree was never made all that explicitly in the post, is that the curb cut to make a driveway removes an on-street parking space. Yes, if you move your car from on the street to your driveway, it somewhat evens out, but there are two differences:

(1) The space is now yours and only yours, and
(2) Even when you're not occupying the space, you're taking that space out of commission.

by Gray on Mar 21, 2013 3:54 pm • link • report

if an area has half acre houses, and plenty of on street parking, not having to build a driveway could allow me to keep it in plants and have less impervious surface. Wouldnt that be good?

by AWalkerInTheCity on Mar 21, 2013 3:55 pm • link • report

It's comparing apples and oranges when you are talking about underground garages and suburban driveways. Without a doubt, driveways add parking spaces for the public, because they provide dedicated spots off the street for the homeowner and maybe some visitors as well. On average, driveways (and single or two-car garages offer more parking off-street than they take away from the street.

It's a fallacy to say that the spots go wasted during working hours. Not everyone is working every day during working hours. Moreover, if the premise is that suburban residents all drive somewhere else to work, then there wouldn't really be any demand for the street parking in those hours, either.

There's a condescending attitude here towards suburban life. not to mention the hostility towards cars and drivers. So, you don't like suburbs. Get over it. Even the comment about the "trashcan lying thoughtlessly on the ground" reveals baseless prejudice. Homeowners do not want their trash cans lying around "thoughtlessly." Either the sanitation workers hastily did this, or the wind did (this happens to lightweight cans when they've been emptied).

If you want to criticize the rules regarding parking for large buildings, have at it. It's got nothing to with residential streets lined with single-family homes.

by Fischy (Ed F.) on Mar 21, 2013 3:58 pm • link • report

(1) The space is now yours and only yours, and
(2) Even when you're not occupying the space, you're taking that space out of commission.

I agree with #2 - perhaps the city could institute some sort of system or financial incentive for enabling property owners to designate their driveway as public space during certain portions of the day when the driveway is not in use.

As for #1, I think something could be said for allotting a certain amount of space in a city to exclusive use by property owners. The owner pays fairly for the land and taxes and keeps the property in an orderly state, and in return a small slice of the curb is designated for his use. On some level it makes sense to me, and believe me I am not one to make property rights into a grand political or philosophical issue very often.

by Scoot on Mar 21, 2013 4:05 pm • link • report

@AWalker -- Some areas only have plenty of on street parking precisely because they do have driveways and one or two garages. As for the space gained if we somehow banned driveways...(which is the only way your argument would make any sense -- given a choice, almost every suburban homeowner would choose to have a driveway, regardless of the law)...more than likely you will just have more grass to cut, with your gasoline-powered lawnmower...and all that fertilizer, which runs into the Chesapeake, killing off all the life there. Or maybe, you'll have a tree, which will get cut down in 20 years -- using an old gas-powered chainsaw without any emissions control, generating the CO2 equivalent each hour of driving a car 3000 miles.

It's a complicated world we live in.

by Fischy (Ed F.) on Mar 21, 2013 4:07 pm • link • report

@Scoot: Sure, I think that's a valid argument. And I don't see this post arguing that driveways are a bad thing. Just that we shouldn't be requiring them.

by Gray on Mar 21, 2013 4:07 pm • link • report

In areas with half-acre zoning, almost everybody who needs to park a car either lives there or is visiting someone there. In some places, there is almost an etiquette it seems that one does not park her car in the street. The parking lanes are basically for isolated events such as parties. Othewise, the wide lane might be for pedestrians.

In the cases I mentioned, people would probably want to pay for off-street parking anyway, so the requirement is probably unnecessary. Out in the burbs, it tends to be the shopping centers with large unneeded parking, but oh the fear people have of shoppers parking on the streets nearby.

In more dense areas, an obvious question arises: Do we really prefer wider roads for the purposes of publicly maintained on-street parking, over a requirement for off-street parking? Perhaps we need neither. But I would prefer that "the need" to provde on-street parking not become the argument against requirements for off-street parking. That is, for all of the inefficiencies of mandatory offstreet parking, how do they compare with the costs (direct plus loss of taxable land) of maintaining these parking lanes?

by JimT on Mar 21, 2013 4:08 pm • link • report

"As for the space gained if we somehow banned driveways...(which is the only way your argument would make any sense -- given a choice, almost every suburban homeowner would choose to have a driveway, regardless of the law)..."

I assumed that some folks might choose not to have a driveway. And I also assumed they would use completely green gardening, particularly native plants.

If everyone given the choice would build a driveway anyway, then there is no cost to dropping the requirement. Why ban what no one would want to do?

I dont think anyone has called for banning driveways, and I would not.

JimT - in places where removing a lane of road (or making it bike lane or transit lane) is possible due to eliminating on street parking, there are differerent issues. Historically many jurisdictions had minimum street widths. Absent on street parking, that area would be paved and devoted to cars anyway. On street parking can serve as traffic calming.

The use of on street parking to shelter bike lanes, as on 15th street in DC, is particularly fascinating. In such a case having more off street parking, and reducing on street, would be a negative for cyclists. Those off street spaces do not shelter cyclists from fast moving motorists.

by AWalkerInTheCity on Mar 21, 2013 4:20 pm • link • report

And I don't see this post arguing that driveways are a bad thing. Just that we shouldn't be requiring them.

Well, the post seems to make (at least) two points:

1) We should not require off-street parking. I'm all for letting the market dictate the need for off-street parking, but in the suburbs you would find a lot of market demand for off-street parking, particularly driveways and garages. So even if you eliminated the requirement, developers would continue to build homes with driveways and garages.

2) Requiring off-street parking actually reduces the availability of parking. This is where I take issue with the post. It seems to happen so rarely that using these occurrences as poster children for eliminating parking minimums is a somewhat futile exercise in convincing the average person or politician to see things your way.

by Scoot on Mar 21, 2013 4:29 pm • link • report

@Scoot: But above, I outlined the two ways that converting on-street parking to a curb cut for a driveway affects the supply of parking, and you seemed to agree with my points. So what, exactly, would you argue is wrong here?

by Gray on Mar 21, 2013 4:36 pm • link • report

@A Walker,
I think you are mainly talking about places where one can not look at the tradeoff between giving up a parking lane and giving up mandatory parking spaces. That largely makes sense (though frankly I am not sure I prefer the protection of a line of parked cars for traffic calming next to a bike route. The door zone hazard, the driver-who-wants-you-in-the-door-zone hazard and the intermittent parking hazard may offset the traffic calming.)
But out in the suburbs where M-NCPPC is requiring the developer to widen the road and provide for off-street parking, can we really say that they should always favor the former over the latter?

by JimT on Mar 21, 2013 4:36 pm • link • report

1/2 acre lots aren't really an issue. It's suburban town homes that always infuriated me. All over fairfax are townhouses with garages that necessitate curb cuts. Any other curb space is yellow and there will maybe be 5 guest spots that are filled with extra family vehicles.

and the simplest fix would be to just have the garages be rear facing and let residents use an alley

by Drumz on Mar 21, 2013 4:41 pm • link • report

PS: My first sentence above was incoherent. I meant to say that I think you mainly are referring to places where narrowing the road is impractical, as opposed to places where officials are planning to widen the road.

by JimT on Mar 21, 2013 4:42 pm • link • report

jimt

Im referring to a line of parked cars OUTSIDE the bike lane. Like on 15th street, creating a cycle track. Not a conventional bike lane next to a conventional line of parked cars.

by AWalkerInTheCity on Mar 21, 2013 4:45 pm • link • report

yes, I was referring mostly to places where narrowing the road is impractical.

but in the case of say, Annandale Road in Fairfax, where there is currently on street parking which absorbs quite a few parked vehicles, and where there is IIUC consideration to removing on street parking to create a bike lane (at least a climbing lane) I would personally be amenable to a 3 foot widening instead, keeping the onstreet parking, and creating a cycle track. I dont suppose the net benefits of the on street parking (even if it mean homeowners could dispense with some offstreet parking) and the incremental benefits to cyclists will justify the cost of the widening, but its nice to think about.

Similarly we have many roads that VDOT has recently widened (including some near proposed WUPs, such as Merrifield and Tyson) Taking out those widenings is virtually impossible now - but conversion to onstreet parking might be possible one day. Again, with the possibility of a sheltered cycle track.

by AWalkerInTheCity on Mar 21, 2013 4:50 pm • link • report

@Gray

Maybe I just don't see the fuss about driveways reducing supply of on-street spaces in places like suburbs of MoCo where there is already plenty of supply in the first place and where driveways often contribute more to on-street supply than they detract.

In Adams Morgan, where I live, usually we see such a high demand for parking relative to supply that even if you eliminated all the driveways and curb cuts and let people park virtually anywhere (in crosswalks, in front of hydrants and next to stop signs, even), there would still not be enough supply. And the concept of induced demand would dictate that increasing the supply in this way would bring even more cars to the area.

During the middle of a workday, when most driveways are unused, there is pretty good (though I would not say ample) empty space for parking. Whether one driveway space is out of commission is usually not an issue. It will be fairly easy to find parking elsewhere.

At night and on weekends, there are virtually no empty spaces, but usually driveways are filled with at least one, sometimes 2 or 3 cars, and then there are the driveways that lead to parking lots that can hold up to 5 or 10 cars or more. At worst, these driveways pose no net gain nor no net loss for street parking, and often pose a net gain as they allow storage for more cars than the space they eliminate.

I think Adams Morgan is a fairly prototypical example of the effect of driveway space in high demand areas in this region, and it is really not the root of the problem, nor even a significant contributor thereto.

by Scoot on Mar 21, 2013 5:05 pm • link • report

I would like to point out that driveways have a negative impact on pedestrians (one more potential danger point) and in places where cyclists have little good on street option and the less confident ones ride the sidewalk, they are particularly dangerous to cyclists. They can also be an aesthetic issue for pedestrians. Thats why DPZ built alleys at Kentlands, and why many similar developments have done so.

by AWalkerInTheCity on Mar 21, 2013 5:19 pm • link • report

This has to be one of the silliest articles yet. Is the American dream too impoverished to allow driveways anymore? Denying the public a parking space? It's private property. Furthermore, if you are trying to take very careful care of your car, then you probably want to have a garage to put it in.

Also I don't see what use this additional street parking space would be to the public anyway. Chances are you would need an RPP to park there, and being in the middle of some suburban neighborhood doesn't seem very helpful to people trying to get to transit or work.

by Chris S. on Mar 21, 2013 5:21 pm • link • report

I outlined the two ways that converting on-street parking to a curb cut for a driveway affects the supply of parking... So what, exactly, would you argue is wrong here?

It does "affect" the supply of parking. By allowing egress from a property, it typically provides multiple spots instead of one. Also, those curb cuts are sometimes even narrower than the width of a car, and may not actually reduce the number of cars that could be legally parked on a given block. On average, they increase the amount of land for parking, so they probably increase the number of cars that can be parked there.

More importantly, they provide guaranteed parking for the folks who LIVE there...the ones who have the greatest need and demand for those spots.

As it happens, I park on the street within a suburban condominium complex. I do this becausemy building does not have a lot next to it, unlike almost every other building in the complex, and because there are not enough spaces in the lots. However, without those lots, it would be a nightmare. The streets would offer a fraction of the parking needed.

People should take public transportation? There isn't any on my street -- and the only bus within walking distance runs sporadically except during weekday commuting times. We could build lots of streetcars and such instead, but that would cost trillions of dollars. And, of course, people would still need their cars in the meantime.

by Fischy (Ed F.) on Mar 21, 2013 5:26 pm • link • report

" Requiring parking spaces for apartment buildings in dense areas near the Red and Purple Lines really is ridiculous"
-----

Considering the Purple Line is still a fantasy that may very well never come to fruition, removing parking minimums because of the "possibility" or, rather, the outside chance that it MIGHT one day be nearby is what's really "ridiculous".

by ceefer66 on Mar 21, 2013 5:27 pm • link • report

"This has to be one of the silliest articles yet. Is the American dream too impoverished to allow driveways anymore?"

where did anyone say ANYTHING about banning.

I am getting sick and tired of having "X shouldnt be required" turned into "they want to ban X"

We dont require people to buy broccoli, to fly to hawaii, or to go to church. Does that mean those things are banned? The irony is this sometimes comes from people who were practically violent that a mandate to buy insurance was not simply in their opinion a bad idea, but that it was a threat to liberty. Its a dishonest, deceptive way to argue, and that its resorted to so often is telling.

Note, that is neither here nor there as to whether any particular parking minimum makes sense. I thought Ben was addressing it in SFH areas close to rail transit stations, where there WILL be demand for on street parking, and there may be RPPs. Somehow we have gone off to half acre lots in deep suburbia, and to urban boulevards. It may not be possible to get back on track, but can we have done with the elision of relaxing requirements for things and banning them?

by AWalkerInTheCity on Mar 21, 2013 5:32 pm • link • report

I would like to point out that driveways have a negative impact on pedestrians (one more potential danger point) and ... they are particularly dangerous to cyclists

You mean for the few seconds each day that the driveway is utilized???

by Scoot on Mar 21, 2013 5:34 pm • link • report

Anyway, encouraging the general public to crowd into suburban neighborhoods to park seems contradictory to making neighborhoods more walkable. Especially in neighborhoods with significant numbers of children or senior citizens out and about, a steady stream of cars zooming in and out doesn't seem conducive to safety.

by Chris S. on Mar 21, 2013 5:47 pm • link • report

Remember, this isn't about banning parking. It's about whether it should be required. In a huge number of buildings/developments built in America you can guarantee parking will be built whether mandated or not.

by Drumz on Mar 21, 2013 6:12 pm • link • report

Scoot,

But if your biking and you run across dozens and hundreds of driveways that's a risk of "a few seconds" over and over again. Especially if the person driving out is used to never seeing anyone there.

by Drumz on Mar 21, 2013 6:30 pm • link • report

But if parking is guaranteed to be built, why were the minimums introduced in the first place?

by Chris S. on Mar 21, 2013 6:38 pm • link • report

@Drumz and Scoot
As I am sure you realize, both driveways and parked cars are hazards to cyclists--and cars coming out of a driveway with parallel parking combine the hazard.
If an entire block (or more) would potentially have no driveways, then forcing the addition of driveways does cause a hazard--especially if parallel parking is allowed. On the other hand, if some people choose driveways, then adding a few more might not be so bad since one must already be on guard. And if requiring driveways for all has the effect of leaving the parking lane entirely open most of the time, then it is probably good.
The gist of my comments here is that depending on the situation, requiring the addition of driveways might add a new hazard that we would otherwise not have--or it might get parked cars off the street and thereby decrease the hazard for cyclists.
In those cases where required offstreet parking will avoid the cost of widening the road to create a parking lane, it seems most reasonable. Or if that allows the parking lane on one or both sides to be removed for bike lanes. Conversely, it makes the least sense when it is adding driveways to a block with no driveways.
As others have pointed out, the half-acre lot situation is very different. The cases where a buyer would not want off-street parking are so rare than the rule is probably most useful if we are talking about a hill where the narrow road has no paved shoulder. On-street parking is a hazard to all, but off-street parking requires expensive grading and maybe a retaining wall.

by JimT on Mar 22, 2013 8:45 am • link • report

It really seems the people who are against parking minimums, including the direct responses to my earlier comment by Alex B, mostly all live in urban, semi-mixed use communities or old small lot housing developments inside the Beltway, where streets were designed to accommodate parking, homes don't always have driveways, lots are fairly small, blocks are fairly regular in size and shape, and there may be commercial or public destinations worth traveling to in short distance by foot.

Lets move the argument outside of the Beltway, where the reality is lot and block sizes and shapes vary greatly, many people live on cul-de-sacs, and there is much less need for 'public' parking on the street in the first place, due to no 'public' or commercial destination near by. The suburbs, especially in the past 15 years, have been engineered to minimize roadways and maximize developable lots. Lots of flag or panhandle lots, lots of lots with shared driveways, lots of cul-de-sac bulbs, even mid block, just to create more street frontage to tie a driveway into the street. Developers are also proposing the most narrow they can build and still meet fire department requirements, often meaning 20' of pavement, which provides for zero parking. Sure, public street cross sections generally are wider, but there has been a proliferation of 'private' streets created in places like suburban Montgomery County, allowing them to not provide on street parking. Without requiring parking minimums on-site, you could quickly deny homeowners any parking by virtue of community design. In some places you can argue the community should be designed better and developers should provide wider roadways, but a lot of the land left to build on is irregularly shaped, has some sort of environmental constraint, or other reason why a straight street with evenly spaced and sized square or rectangle lots just won't happen.

Maybe the code should be modified to say each detached dwelling needs to show proof that 2 or 3 spaces are provided, through a combination of on-site or off-site but along the property street frontage. Each lot can decide how it wants to ensure that some parking is available. Similar with apartments or offices, if you don't provide it on site, you should prove there is a reasonable assumption that it's available off site. This is in simple terms how the Montgomery County Parking Lot District already works. You provide spaces on site, or pay into the district fund to say your site will use available street and garage space already provided in the urban district.

I think the discussion should be to get a 2013 survey of what the current car to dwelling unit ratios are in different development densities and varying proximity to transit, to have an informed reason for providing a certain number of spaces. There is nothing worse than visiting my friends who live in under-parked townhouse or apartment neighborhoods that are also not very transit accessible. It was bad community design like those that created the need for parking minimums in the first place. Clearly the private market didn't want to pay to provide market demand!

by Gull on Mar 22, 2013 9:20 am • link • report

@Gull - Hear, hear

by Chris S. on Mar 22, 2013 9:58 am • link • report

Without requiring parking minimums on-site, you could quickly deny homeowners any parking by virtue of community design.

How so?

Removing parking minimums does not mean you a) remove any existing parking, or b) remove the right to build parking. If there is demand for it, developers will find a way to build it.

You make a compelling case for why parking is needed in low density suburban areas. But I'm not following why, therefore, it should be required in the law.

I think the discussion should be to get a 2013 survey of what the current car to dwelling unit ratios are in different development densities and varying proximity to transit, to have an informed reason for providing a certain number of spaces.

Here's the thing, though. That survey will always be wrong, because it can't capture the actual nature of how people use parking. It's pseudo-science, and we do it now for parking requirements. I'd recommend reading Don Shoup's chapter on the complete lack of precision and accuracy in the forecasts for parking demand - they're a lot more arbitrary than you think. You ask for a survey as if it might provide a difinitive answer, but my response would be that the definitive answer does not exist, and therefore is extraordinarily difficult to code into law.

http://shoup.bol.ucla.edu/TruthInTransportationPlanning.pdf

That said, a survey is already done - but it's done by the private sector doing their market research.

by Alex B. on Mar 22, 2013 10:08 am • link • report

Whoops - missed a tag in there. Grafs 2,3, and 4 (from "How so?" to "You make a...") in the above response should not be in italics, as they are my words.

by Alex B. on Mar 22, 2013 10:12 am • link • report

I've fixed the italics.

by David Alpert on Mar 22, 2013 10:46 am • link • report

Alex,

I think history has shown that the market will always under-provide parking, especially in residential communities, because it's out the door before the homeowners realize how big of a parking problem they have. I've lived in communities where the developer provided each unit 2 and 1/2 spaces, under the premise that each house gets 2, plus half a visitor spot, and then spent plenty a night parking in a neighboring community and walking because everyone actually had 3 cars per house, and visitors just could not ever come over. This was by way of marked on street parking, no one had a driveway.

I also point to the Germantown town center as a place where there is not enough parking on the weekends. They tried to do a bit of mixed use parking calculations and otherwise tried to minimize parking to encourage the town center feeling, but failed to realize it was going to be a regional draw to a region that is very auto-oriented. I'm sure there are plenty of examples in more urban areas where the minimums may cause more harm than good, but I think it's a discussion of removing the minimums from certain zones, or certain neighborhoods, not removing the minimums from the code completely.

by Gull on Mar 22, 2013 11:40 am • link • report

@Gull:

I'm sure there are plenty of examples in more urban areas where the minimums may cause more harm than good . . .

Okay. Since you're sure about this and we agree that in urban parts of MoCo we should remove parking minimums, can we stop arguing about it?

by Gray on Mar 22, 2013 11:48 am • link • report

Gull,

I think history has shown that the market will always under-provide parking, especially in residential communities, because it's out the door before the homeowners realize how big of a parking problem they have.

Please define 'under-provide.' How are you measuring this? What kind of supply, and at what price?

I've lived in communities where the developer provided each unit 2 and 1/2 spaces, under the premise that each house gets 2, plus half a visitor spot, and then spent plenty a night parking in a neighboring community and walking because everyone actually had 3 cars per house, and visitors just could not ever come over. This was by way of marked on street parking, no one had a driveway.

And all this parking was given away for free, yes?

If I want ice cream, I can get a cone at Ben and Jerry's. I pay money and get ice cream in return, and I value ice cream. But on free cone day, there is a huge line. When you give stuff away for free, people tend to overconsume. When the price is zero, suddenly the demand increases.

Now, imagine if you're a Ben and Jerry's manager. How much ice cream do you need to provide? Selling it for a certain price lets you be efficient. However, if every day were free cone day, then you'd need a lot more ice cream to meet the demand.

Then, a regulator walks by. They see all these people in line for free ice cream, and then make the case that because demand for ice cream is so large, we need to mandate that all of these other stores supply ice cream at this rate, too.

Point is, there's no such thing as 'not enough parking' unless you also start talking about the price.

by Alex B. on Mar 22, 2013 12:00 pm • link • report

Most suburban lots are 1/4, not 1/2 acre, and are not square -- they are narrower along the street, with typical lot widths around 50 ft. It is only wealthy, or exurban neighborhoods miles away from the beltway, that have the larger lots, approaching 1 acre. Most newer developments the King Farm have lots 1/8 acre or less, and parking is very tight.

by goldfish on Mar 22, 2013 12:37 pm • link • report

Here's a compromise: We continue to allow private curb cuts and driveways in dense urban areas, but if you don't use the driveway to actually park a car, we (the public) can take it away.

This was a pet peeve of mine when I lived in Georgetown. On a block with 7 curb cuts, not one (!) was actually used to park a car because the garages were either too small for a modern SUV, or filled with junk. Yet the city's parking enforcement arm vigorously defended the emptiness of those curb cuts on behalf of the private owners.

So my proposal: if you do not consistently park your car off-street, then you lose your curb cut.

Or proposal two: Recognize that the curb cut has taken public property (12' of street, 8' wide) and converted it to a private use. Charge market rents. In the 'burbs with plentiful street parking the cut is worthless; in Georgetown, you should pay an extra $20K in taxes per year for the curb cut. That compensates the rest of us for the cost of enforcing your cut.

by David on Mar 24, 2013 7:17 am • link • report