The problem is not the parking spaces. It is also not the roads. Take them away and you only make life more miserable for car commuters. You need two things: 1

The problem is not the parking spaces. It is also not the roads. Take them away and you only make life more miserable for car commuters. You need two things: 1. Attractive alternatives (really good, clean, fast public transport or really good, safe, fast bike lanes) 2. An incentive to not use the car for commuting. The problem with 1. is that politicians find it much harder to create something good than to make it's opposite worse. The problem with 2. is that a car is a relatively expensive investment, so people will use it. You could, for instance, introduce a flexible city toll that allows you 50 days of free entering by car and serves as a PT ticket as well.