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They're subject to parking minimums (they can always provide more!) b/c otherwise they'd try to get by with as little as possible. It's sort of like how they had to be told to have running water, heat and electrical connections or they didn't build units with those amenities 100 years ago. You can argue health, whatever, but it's the principal of the issue.
But in some places the minimums are actually way too much. Like where I work the minimums exceed 1.5 per unit (it seems) and they are trying to get denser. And this is for stuff that is 3 blocks from the train station, where 20% of the users don't have a car! The minimum is rarely something like .5 a unit, it always seems to be in excess of 1 per unit. So many of the buildings have already provided 2 a unit, so having a couple with 1 parking spot a unit wouldn't cause issues. If someone had 2 cars, they could rent/buy in the building on the next block!
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When I went looking for information about the costs of parking, it seems the book you referenced is "The Bible", both in the sense that urbanists seem to quote it a lot, and it's really the ONLY book out there about parking. [/quote]
It is pretty dumb that we spend so much energy on figuring out how much parking we need, without bothering to study it. But it is really a tome. It is 800 or 900 pages on parking, so it is pretty extensive. I doubt many "urbanists" have even read it. I met a civil engineer and she told me she stopped at the intro, and that is her field. LOL. I went to a talk by the author.
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I still think that residential buildings should have to provide off-street parking. I disagree that street parking isn't used very much. Go to any large city and you will see otherwise.
Parking requirements should be regional, and really neighborhood based. Not ever building needs parking, particularly in transit rich areas with few drivers. You need some street parking, I have never claimed otherwise. But you also do not need to build parking to handle Black Friday rushes everywhere.
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Exactly! And they try to convince people to buy/rent w/o the parking. A rental manager once told my daughter and her BF they should sell one of their cars to live in a particular building in downtown Denver. No matter that they both needed cars for work.
But clearly that wasn't the right building for them. Their requirement was 2 parking spaces, and the building didn't have that available. That means it would be a perfect place for a one car couple, so what's wrong with that. Every apartment doesn't need to be for every possible use case.
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Originally Posted by chirack
The trouble is you can't count on the transit always being available. It's hours could change, the subway station could close and sometimes just at not easily done by subway(How many people are going to take an EL ride for Groceries....they usually pay the higher price at the closer store if you are dependent on transit. ). Also jobs are spread all over town, not just in job centers...people have to be able to easily and quickly access them too. I live across the street form an School. While there is plenty of transit available if you relied on it you would be walking at least 2 blocks in all kinds of weather daily.
Sure hours can change, but generally speaking there are minimum standards for operating times, and all of this info is readily available when you are moving in. Clearly you aren't using transit much because people do hop on the subway for shopping and groceries if it is convenient. Walking two blocks to transit options? That is not far, people without deeded parking might have to walk 2 blocks to get to their car! Are you talking weird super long suburban blocks or normal city blocks. That's a couple of minutes in city blocks. 2 minutes in Manhattan blocks.
All of these things are excuses on why you think you can't use transit. I'll use my sister for an example, because she doesn't drive at all, has no car and has no immediate plans to even get a license. When she looked for a job she looked for ones that were near transit lines that were easy for her to get to. If the job was too hard to get to, then she didn't apply. Drivers do the same thing, if a job has an annoying commute for you, you move or write it off. You don't pick a place to live in order to access every job in your metro area. That would be impossible.
We get really caught up in mode of transit and not access. Everyone has a different threshold. Personally, I like most of the stuff I need to be accessible in about 15 minutes door to door. I'd prefer those 15 minutes not to be in a car all the time. For some people that number is 5 minutes, others it is 10, and others it is 30. For some that means car time, for others it means walking time, and others it means on a bike. All of that builds into the decisions we make when we are looking for a place to live or when developers build something. Parking requirements shouldn't be the same for buildings where everything is in a 5 minute walk vs places where it all takes 15 minutes to drive to.
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Originally Posted by chirack
However off-peak transit is more expensive per passenger because there are fewer passengers and off-peak transit can slow down. At night some CTA buses routes have service frequencies of 30 mins. apart. Imagine getting off work at 8 and having to wait 30 mins. for the next bus at night in an unsafe location when you could have driven home in that same 30 min. period.
It's the chicken or the egg situation, off-peak isn't expensive to operate if people use it. They did a round of cuts to our transit agency, and my closest bus is one of those limited run buses. During the cuts they actually extended my bus by 2 hours at night, because more and more people were riding it at the "cut off time." And the last run of the night is really popular, and I take it even more now since it runs later. Since it stops a block from my place, I have been known to plan an outing based on the bus schedule (it runs every 30 minutes during the week), since that one is faster for me than taking the more frequent bus which leaves me with an 8 minute walk home.
As North Beach Person said upthread, 1.5 parking spaces per unit turned out not to be enough. SF-O must be in some sort of bubble. Everywhere I have ever lived, people do not get rid of their cars simply b/c it's more difficult to park them. They just come up with alternatives, like parking illegally.
In regard to off-peak service: Off peak is just that, less than the peak amount, lower volume, whatever you want to call it. If people are riding your route more at night, maybe it's not "off peak".
Last edited by Katarina Witt; 07-22-2014 at 05:42 PM..
As North Beach Person said upthread, 1.5 parking spaces per unit turned out not to be enough. SF-O must be in some sort of bubble. Everywhere I have ever lived, people do not get rid of their cars simply b/c it's more difficult to park them. They just come up with alternatives, like parking illegally.
People in San Francisco ditch their cars! I know loads of people who sold their cars after one too many parking tickets! LOL. Most of them ditched their cars within a year of moving to SF. The other car people live in areas with either a parking spot or where street parking is plentiful. They leave the areas that are hard to park.
It would be more helpful to look at the number way more granularly. Because car-free numbers can vary neighborhood by neighborhood, city wide data isn't helpful because not all are well served by alternatives:
I know my neighborhood has a no-car rate of around 25%, West Oakland, about 3 miles away is poorer and is around 35%. If I recall downtown is more like 50%. I am sure affluent areas in the hills are more like 10% (no transit there). I think the city wide rate is 20% or so. But as you can see it could vary a lot. I would not be shocked if Chinatown was 60%.
Clearly it doesn't make a lot of sense for a city to have tract by tract zoning rules, but you could easily have huge variation in a small geographic area. My sample size was like a 3-4 mile radius from my home. I wish I could find the stats again, but it must have been buried in an economic development doc.
If I were to let's say have rules for the areas near mine, they might look like the following based on the transit access and usage, walkability and the overall development plans for the neighborhoods:
Adams Point: 1
Uptown: .5
Downtown on Broadway: 0
Temescal: .8
Montclair: 2
East Lake: .8
And this is a 3 mile radius! Many parts follow a single street. But these numbers are in line pretty closely with reality, and the patterns of the people currently living there anyway.
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In regard to off-peak service: Off peak is just that, less than the peak amount, lower volume, whatever you want to call it. If people are riding your route more at night, maybe it's not "off peak".
Off-peak is usually defined by outside of commute, but crowds are getting a lot bigger these days! I don't think there is a ridership threshold needed. It is more of a time, not a number. BART "off-peak" is actually really packed!
But in some places the minimums are actually way too much. Like where I work the minimums exceed 1.5 per unit (it seems) and they are trying to get denser. And this is for stuff that is 3 blocks from the train station, where 20% of the users don't have a car! The minimum is rarely something like .5 a unit, it always seems to be in excess of 1 per unit. So many of the buildings have already provided 2 a unit, so having a couple with 1 parking spot a unit wouldn't cause issues. If someone had 2 cars, they could rent/buy in the building on the next block!
The idea is that there is space for both the people who live there(1 space) and guests. Would you like to be the wife who has to walk one block to your car daily because the building does not have parking and both you and your husband need to drive to work in separate cars? Part of having an car is being able to bring the car closer to where you live than the bus. Now for an single, someone who does not need the car daily it might make sense, but it makes no sense and will get old quick if you need to do that every day.
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Parking requirements should be regional, and really neighborhood based. Not ever building needs parking, particularly in transit rich areas with few drivers. You need some street parking, I have never claimed otherwise. But you also do not need to build parking to handle Black Friday rushes everywhere.
I have lived in an transit rich environment but the need to be at work at 4a.m. trumped public transit.
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But clearly that wasn't the right building for them. Their requirement was 2 parking spaces, and the building didn't have that available. That means it would be a perfect place for a one car couple, so what's wrong with that. Every apartment doesn't need to be for every possible use case.
This is why the demographics of Lincoln park are what they are. Yuppies, recent college grads and young families because the area can not appeal to blue collar workers(need the car). Losses appeal as the family gets larger and children grow older(lack of space, need of faster transit as well as better schools). While every apartment does not have to be for every possible use, lack of parking limits the customer base and impacts the neighborhood.
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Sure hours can change, but generally speaking there are minimum standards for operating times, and all of this info is readily available when you are moving in. Clearly you aren't using transit much because people do hop on the subway for shopping and groceries if it is convenient. Walking two blocks to transit options? That is not far, people without deeded parking might have to walk 2 blocks to get to their car! Are you talking weird super long suburban blocks or normal city blocks. That's a couple of minutes in city blocks. 2 minutes in Manhattan blocks.
They might be short blocks but it makes no sense to do so when parking is available. In my experience it is never convenient to shop via transit. It is so much easier to just throw it in the trunk.
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All of these things are excuses on why you think you can't use transit. I'll use my sister for an example, because she doesn't drive at all, has no car and has no immediate plans to even get a license. When she looked for a job she looked for ones that were near transit lines that were easy for her to get to. If the job was too hard to get to, then she didn't apply. Drivers do the same thing, if a job has an annoying commute for you, you move or write it off. You don't pick a place to live in order to access every job in your metro area. That would be impossible.
The difference between your sister and I is that I can both use public transit or drive. This greatly increases the range and hours of any possible job I could take. An relative of mine works downtown, but they had an project in the suburban office that she could do because she had an car. An person without an car may be in a bad position if they need another job that is less well located.
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We get really caught up in mode of transit and not access. Everyone has a different threshold. Personally, I like most of the stuff I need to be accessible in about 15 minutes door to door. I'd prefer those 15 minutes not to be in a car all the time. For some people that number is 5 minutes, others it is 10, and others it is 30. For some that means car time, for others it means walking time, and others it means on a bike. All of that builds into the decisions we make when we are looking for a place to live or when developers build something. Parking requirements shouldn't be the same for buildings where everything is in a 5 minute walk vs places where it all takes 15 minutes to drive to.
And they usually are not. Chicago's parking requirements can be low, but they are there.
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It's the chicken or the egg situation, off-peak isn't expensive to operate if people use it. They did a round of cuts to our transit agency, and my closest bus is one of those limited run buses. During the cuts they actually extended my bus by 2 hours at night, because more and more people were riding it at the "cut off time." And the last run of the night is really popular, and I take it even more now since it runs later. Since it stops a block from my place, I have been known to plan an outing based on the bus schedule (it runs every 30 minutes during the week), since that one is faster for me than taking the more frequent bus which leaves me with an 8 minute walk home.
Off-peak is always expensive because by definition it is off peak. Not everywhere can support 24 hour transit with reasonable frequency nor should it always try. Also San Francisco is just one place where cars don't work well. It is surrounded by water on 3 sides(no where to expand but one direction). Most places have room to expand or grow. It also has ridiculously high land prices which price out certain groups and so the only way that city could grow or function is with transit. New York is built on islands and again lack of space and those bridges make transit viable but many other places are surrounded by farm fields in which case growing outward is cheaper than growing upward.
The idea is that there is space for both the people who live there(1 space) and guests. Would you like to be the wife who has to walk one block to your car daily because the building does not have parking and both you and your husband need to drive to work in separate cars? Part of having an car is being able to bring the car closer to where you live than the bus. Now for an single, someone who does not need the car daily it might make sense, but it makes no sense and will get old quick if you need to do that every day.
I think your car expectations aren't reasonable for every environment. For example, in this hypothetical two car family scenario. First if we needed two cars, then 2 parking spaces would be a must have on the shopping list for a place to live. Second, hypothetically, if one of us had to park on the street, I'd make my husband do it. I am old-fashioned.
If you live in a denser area, there is absolutely no rule that says your car should be closer than the bus stop. That's a want not a requirement. If that's a critical need for you, then it goes back to choosing the right neighborhood/apartment. And of course if parking was so burdensome...then you guessed it...it is time to pick a new home!
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I have lived in an transit rich environment but the need to be at work at 4a.m. trumped public transit.
So you are one of the people that has to have a car to get to work. What percentage of your neighbors need to get to work at 4. Or even the people that you know? I imagine it is pretty small, so while a car is the best option for you, if I worked from 11-8, transit might be the best option for me. We can't build assuming everyone has to work at 4 and take a private car to get there, that's just not reality in most places.
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This is why the demographics of Lincoln park are what they are. Yuppies, recent college grads and young families because the area can not appeal to blue collar workers(need the car). Losses appeal as the family gets larger and children grow older(lack of space, need of faster transit as well as better schools). While every apartment does not have to be for every possible use, lack of parking limits the customer base and impacts the neighborhood.
Maybe, maybe not. So OK, people who need easy parking don't live in Lincoln Park, or the Gold Coast or whatever other neighborhood. They pick one that meets their needs. Is there enough demand to fill the neighborhood? Then it doesn't seem like there is an issue.
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They might be short blocks but it makes no sense to do so when parking is available. In my experience it is never convenient to shop via transit. It is so much easier to just throw it in the trunk.
I shop via car, bike, transit, walking. It all depends on what I need to buy. If I need to get let's say a table, well my car is a better option (or renting a truck). If I need to buy toilet paper? It doesn't matter, all are fine. If I am buying a few pieces of clothing? Well it is fine via any mode. I even go grocery shopping only bike. Or I get groceries on the way home from work and walk several blocks with my bags to the parking garage. In some cases, like shopping in downtown San Francisco, taking transit to the mall is easier than the car. The train stop is in the mall. The parking garage is across the street.
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The difference between your sister and I is that I can both use public transit or drive. This greatly increases the range and hours of any possible job I could take. An relative of mine works downtown, but they had an project in the suburban office that she could do because she had an car. An person without an car may be in a bad position if they need another job that is less well located.
It depends on the type of job you have. Around 65% of the types of companies she wants to work for are in areas accessible by transit. So she leaves off a few companies from the list. It isn't a big deal. I drive, but I eliminate half of the Bay Area from my job prospects because the traffic is too horrible. There is no difference, we all make decisions for work based on the commute time. I've passed up some really good opportunities for the location.
Here's a thought experiment to think about the cost of parking in a major city. Imagine if you shut down all mass transit into New York, New York, and then everybody had to drive and park in the city
There's more variables here than in the Drake Equation, and they're about as simple to estimate. If you shut down all mass transit into NY, the residential and commercial distribution of the entire region changes. You're just not going to get a useful result from this thought experiment.
I think your car expectations aren't reasonable for every environment. For example, in this hypothetical two car family scenario. First if we needed two cars, then 2 parking spaces would be a must have on the shopping list for a place to live. Second, hypothetically, if one of us had to park on the street, I'd make my husband do it. I am old-fashioned.
If you live in a denser area, there is absolutely no rule that says your car should be closer than the bus stop. That's a want not a requirement. If that's a critical need for you, then it goes back to choosing the right neighborhood/apartment. And of course if parking was so burdensome...then you guessed it...it is time to pick a new home! Also in almost every residential area on the street parking will always be closer than a bus stop. It just might not be available.
And lots of people do exactly that. Pick an new home. They want more space for their money and move out of areas like that as their needs change.
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So you are one of the people that has to have a car to get to work. What percentage of your neighbors need to get to work at 4. Or even the people that you know? I imagine it is pretty small, so while a car is the best option for you, if I worked from 11-8, transit might be the best option for me. We can't build assuming everyone has to work at 4 and take a private car to get there, that's just not reality in most places.
I know people who work all kinds of shifts in all parts of the city. Using transit for them would often be non-ideal. An 9-5 job in the loop, CTA is great. Need to work elsewhere and nope, not so good. You will waste time waiting for the bus and transfering.
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Maybe, maybe not. So OK, people who need easy parking don't live in Lincoln Park, or the Gold Coast or whatever other neighborhood. They pick one that meets their needs. Is there enough demand to fill the neighborhood? Then it doesn't seem like there is an issue.
Bit more complicated than that. What happens is the more well off buy up the parking and the less well off or those unable or unwilling to spend $200 an month in parking, do without the car or go elsewhere. Hence it concentrates wealth and class in one spot. Not an good thing over-all.
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I shop via car, bike, transit, walking. It all depends on what I need to buy. If I need to get let's say a table, well my car is a better option (or renting a truck). If I need to buy toilet paper? It doesn't matter, all are fine. If I am buying a few pieces of clothing? Well it is fine via any mode. I even go grocery shopping only bike. Or I get groceries on the way home from work and walk several blocks with my bags to the parking garage. In some cases, like shopping in downtown San Francisco, taking transit to the mall is easier than the car. The train stop is in the mall. The parking garage is across the street.
CTA el stops are usually not in malls. You would have to lug your stuff to the train first.
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It depends on the type of job you have. Around 65% of the types of companies she wants to work for are in areas accessible by transit. So she leaves off a few companies from the list. It isn't a big deal. I drive, but I eliminate half of the Bay Area from my job prospects because the traffic is too horrible. There is no difference, we all make decisions for work based on the commute time. I've passed up some really good opportunities for the location.
But if she had an car and could drive she could consider 100% of them.
I don't know where the OP was getting the $1.6 million per mile number. Must be very old data. A recent freeway project in IL cost about $10M per lane mile. That's at least $40 million. Even if the land were free $20 million would be close to rock bottom. Whether it is politically possible to raise road taxes to fully fund the highway system is debatable. But as electric and natural gas vehicles proliferate, it is clear the motor fuel tax is becoming obsolete.
The idea is that there is space for both the people who live there(1 space) and guests. Would you like to be the wife who has to walk one block to your car daily because the building does not have parking and both you and your husband need to drive to work in separate cars? Part of having an car is being able to bring the car closer to where you live than the bus. Now for an single, someone who does not need the car daily it might make sense, but it makes no sense and will get old quick if you need to do that every day.
It's not an ideal, but in a dense area space is limited, a policy that promotes more units would be better. I don't see any reason why the city should expend effort and alter development patterns to ensure this doesn't happen. But I wouldn't have an expectation that I'd always be able to park within one block of where I live in the city anyway. Why should you expect parking and driving to as easy as low density suburbia? Cars aren't as good of a fit in dense cities.
It's not an ideal, but in a dense area space is limited, a policy that promotes more units would be better. I don't see any reason why the city should expend effort and alter development patterns to ensure this doesn't happen. But I wouldn't have an expectation that I'd always be able to park within one block of where I live in the city anyway. Why should you expect parking and driving to as easy as low density suburbia? Cars aren't as good of a fit in dense cities.
Depends on which parts, for 90% of Chicago, cars work fine. Only when density gets extreme does it not work. The trouble with lack of parking is that it can be limiting as to who can work or live there and what can be done there. Space is already limited and thus as density increases the space available for other things like a lawn, an garage, or an garden decreases. There is an market for high density living, but it isn't the only market in the city nor will any area the size of an town be 100% of that. If you want space for working class people to live and for families then you need some minimums. What is tolerable for an single twenty year old can be an burden to an 30 year old with an family and an job that isn't located near transit or with hours where transit is reasonable. Having to walk blocks to your car when you live in an residential area is annoying. This is why some areas in town have parking restrictions so that the residents can at least park on their block. Buildings without parking in an area be it residential or commercial will dump their auto traffic somewhere and the last thing you want to be is going home at 6:00 p.m. to find you have to park three blocks away because all the spaces are taken and you have no off the street parking.
Anyway what parking min. do is take the pressure off on street parking so that there are some on the street spaces free for other uses and users. If there is enough off the street parking in an residential area some of your neighbors can park their cars on their property and you can park your car near your house instead of having to haul groceries back three blocks. It also makes it much less likely that people in the area will support parking restrictions which can have an economic effect on business as the people who live on the block and the people who need to do other business are not taking up all the parking in the area.
Anyway the problem of Chicago isn't need more units there are plenty of units available in town, but units located near "hip" areas go for much more than those located in far areas and there are people unwilling to live in less hip areas. It is either the City or an boring safe burb with little in between.
Last edited by chirack; 07-22-2014 at 08:34 PM..
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