Zoning's role in Austin's unaffordability (Howe, Dorchester: affordable apartments, homes, neighborhood)

[Novacek]

Originally Posted by centralaustinite

But the city can and does grant waivers for that requirement! And the house in question only has one spot off street and one spot on the street!

What's the house in question (address)?


I'd imagine the waivers are mainly for legacy houses that don't meet newer requirements (partially grandfathered). I'd have a hard time imaginng the city would waive a 12 off-street parking spot requirement (duplex 6 bedrooms per side) down to 1 spot off street for brand new construction. Unless it was perhaps literally right next to rail transit (ie not yet in existence).

[Spacepup]

Originally Posted by Novacek

Sounds like in your case, the city needs to prohibit parking along one side of the street. It's easy enough to do (just takes a few signs and some paint). They just did it in my neck of the woods (Ohlen road).

Of course, that's completely separate and orthogonal to "stealth dorms". Lowering the number of unrelated occupants doesn't prevent the family with 2 teenagers which now has 4 cars. Or the guy with his pickup, his daily driver, and his project car, and his wife's car.

Sounds to me like the best, most targeted, solution to the claimed problem is just a parking permit zone. The proposed change reeks of ulterior motives.

[Novacek]

Originally Posted by Spacepup

Sounds to me like the best, most targeted, solution to the claimed problem is just a parking permit zone. The proposed change reeks of ulterior motives.

Parking permit zones are evil. They take public property and allocate it to a specific and limited group.

[Spacepup]

Originally Posted by Novacek

Parking permit zones are evil. They take public property and allocate it to a specific and limited group.

Well you could also argue that they prevent a tragedy of the commons style abuse of a public resource by rationing it.

Either way they are a lesser evil than a citywide or even local occupancy limit change as they can be much more finely targeted to minimize unintended consequences: only this area, only between the hours of X-Y, only weekdays, etc.

[ImOnFiya]

Originally Posted by gpurcell

Sigh.

There are stealth dorms. It is a fact.

If it is a fact, then there is no problem proving it.

[balor123]

Why not just build more parking spots? You could either build some parking garages or add them to structures which don't already have them. No space for one you say? Tear it down and build something taller in its place. Cars on bottom, people on top. Just need to get rid of this 15' tent nonsense.

That won't solve the traffic problem of course but it will definitely mitigate the effect from growth. Those people are going to live somewhere. That can either be a 5min drive from work or a 45min drive. And the latter is a superset of the routes covered in the former.

[verybadgnome]

It's sad that vehicle storage issues are so central to how we allocate resources within a city. I am not sure I can go along with the one parking spot per resident approach as I somehow made it through college without owning a car. If there was such a mandate that one space would have been mostly wasted. If you live in Hyde Park and go to UT you have three other options beside a personal car to get there: car2go, biking and transit. I think the more central the location and the more transit connections within walking distance the fewer the parking minimums there should be.

On a side note there is no such thing as 'free parking,' there is only pay parking and subsidized parking. Unfortunately the latter results in lots of waste as anyone who shopped on Black Friday who saw the unfilled parking lots can attest.

[scm53]

Originally Posted by verybadgnome

It's sad that vehicle storage issues are so central to how we allocate resources within a city. I am not sure I can go along with the one parking spot per resident approach as I somehow made it through college without owning a car.

Two questions:

1. If city code requires two off street parking spaces for each residence, and one per bedroom for duplexes, why is there any significant need for on street parking?

2. This is one of the census tracts with high bike commuter share - almost 13% of trips. If there is that much daily bike usage, why the need for so much parking?

[10scoachrick]

Originally Posted by scm53

Two questions:

1. If city code requires two off street parking spaces for each residence, and one per bedroom for duplexes, why is there any significant need for on street parking?

2. This is one of the census tracts with high bike commuter share - almost 13% of trips. If there is that much daily bike usage, why the need for so much parking?

A) I don't believe that to be accurate...just a guess

2) Commuting by bike leaves the vehicle at home...IN a parking space! How many of those folks making the ...ahem...13% of trips by bike don't own a vehicle?

Heck, there are neighborhoods with three-car garages and vehicles parked all along the street

[balor123]

It's sad that vehicle storage issues are so central to how we allocate resources within a city.

It's even more sad that schools are so central to how we allocate resources within a city. Access to schools forces people to live in houses and neighborhoods they don't want to live in. It tempts them to spend more than they can really afford. It forces them to drive long distances to work. It blights large portions of cities.

Boston spent $15 billion on the Big Dig. The annual school budget, by comparison, is only $900mil. Imagine what they could have accomplished with that money if they put it towards rapid gentrification of Dorchester (which is actually bigger than Boston!). When I read about projects like burying I-35, I can't help but be reminded of the Big Dig. Fix up East Austin people. Not a 50 year plan. Not a 20 year plan. Get it done in 5 years. Just tear the whole thing apart and make it awesome.