There's actually a whole (fairly thick) book pretty much entirely about this question: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_High_Cost_of_Free_Parking https://en.wi

There's actually a whole (fairly thick) book pretty much entirely about this question: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_High_Cost_of_Free_Parking https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_High_Cost_of_Free_Parking The gist is that we use more parking than would be societally optimal because it's “free”, which really just means that non-drivers subsidize drivers. It would be like if every restaurant were expected to be all-you-can-eat: we'd societally consume more food than was optimal.