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I never knew loss of parking was even a thing in the US. I can't imagine it being as bad as within European cities where most of the streets (and adjacent build
by mxscho 7y ago
I never knew loss of parking was even a thing in the US.
I can't imagine it being as bad as within European cities where most of the streets (and adjacent buildings) have been built before cars were a thing. Probably one of the main reasons why alternatives to cars are well-received is that cars have never been an option anyways, especially in historic districts.
Big cars are another dimension of this problem.
American cars are usually larger because they don't have these types of issues.
You won't see a majority of people driving pickup trucks in Europe.
Where I live, the two biggest fears about non-car transportation is that it's a) inconvenient or stressful and full of delays (for public transport) or b) too dangerous (for stuff like electric scooters).
- _delirium 7y agoIt depends on the city, but there's a weird entitlement in some big, dense American cities from people who feel they have an inherent right to store their car for free or very cheap on public land, when that land is in the middle of a dense city with a ton of competing uses for public land (bike lanes, sidewalks, pickup/delivery zones, street trees, bus lanes, heck even traffic lanes). In the densest cities, these also tend to be more affluent people. Oddly, though, also usually the kind of affluent people who consider themselves environmentalist and liberal. At least that's true in NYC and DC, two cities with substantial neighborhood pushback against reallocating street parking to other uses, happening in well-off neighborhoods that are full of signs promoting liberal causes (Upper West Side NYC, Dupont Circle DC, etc.). I can see it in lower-density, car-dependent areas, where you arguably need somewhere to park, and poorer residents of apartment buildings without their own off-street parking might be impacted. But the cognitive dissonance around being an affluent liberal in Manhattan and suing to stop a bike lane [1] because you don't want to lose free street parking in Manhattan is absurd. Of course, they're still environmentalist because they support banning straws. [1] https://nyc.streetsblog.org/2019/07/30/breaking-upper-west-side-nimbys-sue-city-over-central-park-west-bike-lane/ https://nyc.streetsblog.org/2019/07/30/breaking-upper-west-s...
- isostatic 7y agoIt's crazy that Manhattan doesn't have a blanket "15 minutes only" rule for parking, no return within an hour, which gives enough time for deliveries and dropoff/pickups, but prevents garaging. The value of a typical 17 square metre parking space in Manhattan is about $400k [0]. If you want to park your car on the road, rather than paying for a commercial garage, you should be paying for that land. [0] 22.83 square miles of land in Manhattan is 78304708.32 square metres. Parallel parking space is 2.76m by 6.1m according to https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-size-of-a-standard-parking-spot https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-size-of-a-standard-parking...
- fooblitzky 7y agoSee 35th Ave NE in Seattle.
- analog31 7y agoI live in a mid sized town, and a contentious issue is parking for government employees. The people who have free parking consider it to be a benefit of their jobs. There was a big hooplah in my neighborhood when a nearby government building converted to being leased from a developer, who immediately started charging for parking. Most of the employees found places to park on the nearby residential streets, annoying the residents due to the added congestion and traffic, including on a street that was already a designated bike thoroughfare. I certainly support better urban planning, and I get around town by bike whenever possible, but I'm also sympathetic to the short term disruptions that people have adapted to parking arrangements that can change overnight.
- baud147258 7y ago> historic districts. Thing is, historic districts don't make up most of cities, even before the post-war rebuild/new cities expansion.