4 ms·

If every house needs two spots - on off street, one on street right in front of the house, all is well. Then someone says "Why should I pay for a parking spot

by ars 2y ago

If every house needs two spots - on off street, one on street right in front of the house, all is well. Then someone says "Why should I pay for a parking spot or a garage? I'll just park on-street by my neighbor!" That only works if a couple people do it. Once too many do it you have unhappy residents - they paid for their off-street spot but the other guy didn't!

alistairSH 2y ago
We probably shouldn’t provide “free” on-street parking everywhere either. Make car users pay for that choice. [yes I realize that’s a change to 70+ years of urban design and can’t happen ovrrnight]
- ghaff 2y ago
  The alternatives are not necessarily free to the neighborhood as a whole. A lot of places would have to build a bunch of garages if they were to eliminate any on-street parking. So now you have more garages everywhere. Maybe that's a good tradeoff. Maybe it's not. But I'm familiar with urban neighborhood with on street (mostly permit or metered) parking that have very few garages or parking lots at all.
  - alistairSH 2y ago
    Paid permits and meters are fine - that solves the “stealing all the free spaces” problem mentioned above. The point is a some close to a market solution should be feasible and desirable.
    - ghaff 2y ago
      In the cities I’m familiar with essentially all street parking is metered or resident. There’s a cost for resident parking but it’s typically a lot less than a monthly garage spot would be. When a lot of people talk about “free” parking I think they’re mostly lumping those in. Resident parking spots are certainly an oversubscribed common resource in many areas.
lokar 2y ago
Everyone pays, either in time or money. The point is to decouple this from the payment for housing. If every apartment comes with two spots, why not have two cars (and drive more). If you have to pay a market rate (in time or money) to park each car you may well decide to make due with one car.

by ars 2y ago

alistairSH 2y ago

We probably shouldn’t provide “free” on-street parking everywhere either. Make car users pay for that choice. [yes I realize that’s a change to 70+ years of urban design and can’t happen ovrrnight]

ghaff 2y ago
The alternatives are not necessarily free to the neighborhood as a whole. A lot of places would have to build a bunch of garages if they were to eliminate any on-street parking. So now you have more garages everywhere. Maybe that's a good tradeoff. Maybe it's not. But I'm familiar with urban neighborhood with on street (mostly permit or metered) parking that have very few garages or parking lots at all.
- alistairSH 2y ago
  Paid permits and meters are fine - that solves the “stealing all the free spaces” problem mentioned above. The point is a some close to a market solution should be feasible and desirable.
  - ghaff 2y ago
    In the cities I’m familiar with essentially all street parking is metered or resident. There’s a cost for resident parking but it’s typically a lot less than a monthly garage spot would be. When a lot of people talk about “free” parking I think they’re mostly lumping those in. Resident parking spots are certainly an oversubscribed common resource in many areas.

lokar 2y ago

Everyone pays, either in time or money. The point is to decouple this from the payment for housing. If every apartment comes with two spots, why not have two cars (and drive more). If you have to pay a market rate (in time or money) to park each car you may well decide to make due with one car.