Welcome to City-Data.com Forum!
U.S. CitiesCity-Data Forum Index
Go Back   City-Data Forum > General Forums > Urban Planning
 [Register]
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
View detailed profile (Advanced) or search
site with Google Custom Search

Search Forums  (Advanced)
 
Old 04-02-2020, 06:35 AM
 
Location: From the Middle East of the USA
1,533 posts, read 1,499,825 times
Reputation: 1910

Advertisements

Urban planners need to work with real estate and property management companies more. So many of our cities are building so many apartments and condos in chic neighborhoods, art districts, and central business districts, that are streets are being clogged with traffic. It's hard to walk down the street to the local eatery or bar in peace because the street traffic has increased to the point that you have to be more aware of speeders than enjoying your time loving the architecture of a building, a beautiful landscaped yard, or having a conversation with your partner.

When zoning permits are approved, does the city consider these factors? Is there a realization that some city streets can only support so much traffic?
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message

 
Old 04-02-2020, 09:49 AM
 
Location: East of Seattle since 1992, 615' Elevation, Zone 8b - originally from SF Bay Area
44,082 posts, read 80,136,113 times
Reputation: 56876
Unfortunately many bigger cities, such as Seattle approve new condos/apartments with no garages or parking lots, assuming that people will walk, bike, or take the bus or Uber. Meanwhile, the new residents have 1-2 cars, and fight over the few available spaces on the streets.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 04-02-2020, 11:52 PM
 
Location: New York NY
5,508 posts, read 8,690,875 times
Reputation: 12663
Developers will prefer to build where the return on investment is highest and most likely—precisely the type of neighborhoods the OP describes. That’s certainly true in metros where building costs are uniform throughout, but demand is far less so. Developers will follow the demand of people with the most housing dollars to spend.

So those neighborhoods become increasingly crowded and expensive, regardless of whether there is mass transit or not. Until, of course, if and when the bubble bursts. Moreover, transit oriented development, i.e. building near major bus or train hubs, is now in style so as to reduce car traffic. That can result in fewer cars, but more crowded buses, trains, and in some cities, more cabs and ride shares.

Transit planning is basically a public responsibility, not a private one. As such, it is usually done in an entirely different atmosphere than private development. The overlap between the two will too often leave a lot of people unhappy.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 04-03-2020, 09:51 AM
 
Location: Providence, RI
12,581 posts, read 21,733,355 times
Reputation: 14047
Quote:
Originally Posted by Hemlock140 View Post
Unfortunately many bigger cities, such as Seattle approve new condos/apartments with no garages or parking lots, assuming that people will walk, bike, or take the bus or Uber. Meanwhile, the new residents have 1-2 cars, and fight over the few available spaces on the streets.
The politics and economics of adding parking rarely make sense for in town developments in America's more urban cities. New surface parking lots are a nonstarter in many urban areas. Here in Boston, there's political backlash against new surface lots as they're seen as anti-urban. But more importantly, it's not cost effective in most in-town neighborhoods. Real estate prices mean acquiring land and using it for surface parking doesn't equate to an ROI that makes any sense for a developer. Parking garages may offer more ROI in the long run, but they are extremely expensive to build ($20-30k for above ground, $30-90k for underground), and again, it's not an easy move politically to add hundreds of parking spaces to neighborhoods already dealing with traffic clogged streets. Because of the cost to build a garage (and the cost to fight for approvals), rentals and condos with garages (and even surface parking) are quite a bit more expensive than those without parking included.

Finally, in most cities, there isn't a actually a shortage of available parking spaces. Again in Boston, most garages in in-town neighborhoods are not at capacity, even at the height of the work day (or nights/weekends in more residential areas). People fighting over street spaces isn't generally a function of a parking shortage, but a function of residential permits and meters being too cheap. In many central neighborhoods resident parking spots on the street are free (permits in Boston are free), but monthly parking at garages can exceed $400. So people fight over the street spots while the garages sit nearly empty outside if work hours. It's not on developers to shoulder the cost to permit and build expensive garages with a glut of parking already available.

Ironically, the garages in my area with the biggest capacity issues are the garages at transit hubs. Many subway and commuter rail station garages fill up long before 8am. Instead of focusing on garages and parking at in-town developments, we should build more parking at suburban transit hubs and focus on increasing transit capacity (where there's a LOT more room for growth than roadways which are already clogged). That's a much better way to improve mobility for most people. Our capacity to add residents and businesses to urban areas should not be handicapped by available street parking which is extremely finite. And I don't see any issue with limiting neighborhood parking permits issued and encouraging new residents who want to have 1-2 cars to pay the premium to park in one of the many available garages nearby. A car in downtown New York, San Francisco, Seattle, Chicago, Boston, DC, Philadelphia, etc. is a luxury, not a need or entitlement.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 04-03-2020, 10:02 AM
 
Location: East of Seattle since 1992, 615' Elevation, Zone 8b - originally from SF Bay Area
44,082 posts, read 80,136,113 times
Reputation: 56876
Right now, the garages are pretty much empty in Seattle and other cities with everyone working from home. Normally, many of them are full every weekday, despite the charges running $30/day and $350/month downtown. Most of the less expensive surface lots have been eliminated for new high-rise offices or apartments in the last 15 years or so. Meter rates are from $0.50-$4.50/hour

depending on location and time of day, free Sundays and 8pm-8am.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 04-03-2020, 11:00 AM
 
Location: From the Middle East of the USA
1,533 posts, read 1,499,825 times
Reputation: 1910
I'm glad that so many residents are returning to the actual "city," instead of living in the suburbs or a neighboring county. However, if most city officials do not grasp the problem with what this is doing to our interior streets, city living will be a nightmare.
If there is a market for condos and apartments, surely there is a market for surface parking lots? Maybe city officials should require developers to incorporate parking for 30% of approved projects to alleviate street traffic? Maybe less...
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 04-03-2020, 02:43 PM
 
Location: Forest bathing
3,183 posts, read 2,443,493 times
Reputation: 7219
Quote:
Originally Posted by Hemlock140 View Post
Unfortunately many bigger cities, such as Seattle approve new condos/apartments with no garages or parking lots, assuming that people will walk, bike, or take the bus or Uber. Meanwhile, the new residents have 1-2 cars, and fight over the few available spaces on the streets.
In Bellingham, there is a proposal to eliminate two lanes on a 4 lane street with center turn lane for street parking. This is a busy congested area but planners are allowing 4 and 5 story apartments to be built. There is pushback from area neighbors with a change.org petition.

My question is, who would want to live next to a freeway? The developers state that they will be rented at market rates so these units will not be for low income. The low income housing is being built across the street and not subject to freeway noise.

These units are considered part of an urban village so stores will be below and living units above. They have been built out to the street so no parking is available. The properties they replaced had ample parking for customers.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 04-03-2020, 11:35 PM
 
Location: Taos NM
5,314 posts, read 5,036,270 times
Reputation: 6677
Denver's been doing this for a while, taking the existing grid, infilling with apartments and hoping that driving becomes so miserable people stop doing it. They want Denver to be some sort of Philadelphia or something despite the fact that you need a car to get in the mountains and it's dumb to live in Denver if you never go to the mountains.

Cities came about because it shortened the time traveled between places. A lot of newer cities were built in an auto grid which was pretty efficient at moving people around, then as they got bigger, traffic started to snarl and "alternative commuting" is now the chic answer to the congestion problem. The problem is though, that not only are they not funding roadways enough, their answers to "alternative commuting" are really half hearted and underfunded as well. I bike to work, but the trail is so crowded people are dying because they run into each other and there's bike traffic jams. Likewise scooters didn't really pan out to be an optimal solution either, because there's no transitway for them to operate on.

Rail really only serves to funnel people in and out of central business districts and central business districts are built on the idea that if you have enough people in enough offices there will be knowledge spillover effects and you'll be able to recruit from a large radius for potential employees. Covid-19 is putting to the test how essential offices really are and I believe after this, employers will be looking to fill seats remotely rather than in some downtown office.

With this infill of parking spaces, what happens is whole sectors of the city become shut off to me using my car to visit them, or I get towed by the parking Nazis. Do I have an alternative to get to these zones without a car? No. There's no rail line, the bus is super slow, I'm not spending $13 on Uber (which does nothing to help roadway congestion), my bike is guaranteed to be stolen if I bike somewhere (Denver has a horrible bike theft problem), and its too far to walk. So where I end up going is my 20 minute walking radius around work and my house, and out to the burbs driving. There's this whole donut zone around downtown Denver I never go to because I can't get there easily, despite it being only a couple miles away.

It's ironic because it self defeats the purpose of having a city/urban center. If I'm limited to my small sectors of the city, I might as well live in a small city where I can drive to everything I need. If it takes 30 minutes to alternative commute 4 miles in Denver and 30 minutes to drive across the entirety of Colorado Springs, COS offers a lot more amenities in my commute radius despite the smaller size. But it all boils down to the OPs point, development increasing density needs to be built with a plan on how those additional people are going to move around, alternative commuting or regular.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.

Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.


Reply
Please update this thread with any new information or opinions. This open thread is still read by thousands of people, so we encourage all additional points of view.

Quick Reply
Message:


Over $104,000 in prizes was already given out to active posters on our forum and additional giveaways are planned!

Go Back   City-Data Forum > General Forums > Urban Planning

All times are GMT -6.

© 2005-2024, Advameg, Inc. · Please obey Forum Rules · Terms of Use and Privacy Policy · Bug Bounty

City-Data.com - Contact Us - Archive 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37 - Top