This is not really because parking lots are not legalized (they are, and in fact are often required) but because structured parking is so expensive to build; $25-35k per space in an above ground garage and $35-50k per space underground. https://dcplm.com/blog/cost-of-building-a-parking-garage/

The only place I'm aware of that bans new parking garages in the US is Manhattan, which has a general parking cap; but providing enough spaces for the actual car travel demand to Manhattan would necessitate leveling the whole island and then some, so the policy is there to get people to stop driving to a narrow, congested island.

Yes, the system developed as it did for a reason, some of the more obscure being: + entrenched rent-seekers controlling properties in cities (it's almost axiomatic) + centralized transportation systems being subject to political and labor capture-- the main purpose is not great customer service + red tape in urban areas for everything + market forces created last-resort poor quality housing in cities + the car vs transit battle is winner-take-all at a neighborhood level, and transit does not compete properly on a metro or regional level, nor is the park-and-ride system fully competitive + car-compatible density negates transit density + different ownership model for rolling stock leads to over-investment for cars and under-investment for transit (you buy the car you personally can afford and it sits idle while you ride the subway car your grandparents' generation was willing to pay for collectively )

And cheaper! A roundtrip 10 min bus ride into town costs my family £6. That's more expensive than driving in and parking for 3-4 hours.

The solution to poor people not having enough money is to give them more money (if you really want to help them).

It's not to make random consumer goods like parking free for all. If you do this, most of the goods will be used by people who are not poor, so it's very inefficient at helping you achieve your goal of helping poor people.

In addition, many poor people won't want the thing you are making free. In the case of parking that could be because they don't own a car, so this plan doesn't help a portion of the population you are trying to help. Even more inefficient!

When people think we should have free parking to help the poor, it's mostly just status quo bias at work. Most people would never say that we should make bread free. Or that we should make milk free. Parking isn't any different.

Part of what it allows is more housing (something that places like San Fran fail miserably at) because it's not constrained by having to provide 1.5 spots per bedroom or whatever arbitrary number.

And more housing is what is needed to contain housing costs.

It benefits the poor by allocating resources as efficiently as possible. If there is someone who is poor enough that they need help from society/the government, it would be much more effective to transfer money directly to the, rather than very very poorly (probably regressively in fact) target that help by having the public subsidize parking on their block.

They would rather have the $100 in efficient redistribution rather than the government spend $100 so that they can benefit by $1.

Most poor people don't own their house and often don't have a car – if you do own both you're middle class.

You can't means-test a parking space. You could, in theory, set parking prices based on the value of the land its by.

One of the ways it benefits them is by reducing traffic congestion so buses can get through. A significant amount of traffic in parking-contested areas is from cars looking for parking.

California loves kneecapping itself.

I guess the solution would be to make these spots 2/4 hr parking, instead of permanent overnight parking for all. Or remove parking all together and make it easy to build private parking lots.

SF's lack of grade separated transport outside the narrow BART corridor also makes it hard to convince people out of driving. Buses and trams aren't acceptable alternatives for a city as rich and dynamic as SF.

No, according to this article by Chris Elmendorf and Darien Shanske https://www.spur.org/news/2020-12-18/how-solve-transit-budge..., Proposition 218, 26, and the California Vehicle Code probably do not prohibit market pricing of residential parking permits as endorsed by Donald Shoup, since street parking is not just a fee-based service, but city-owned land that the city has the right to rent at market rate. San Francisco just hasn’t tried.

What does administer the program mean in this case? Does it include the maintenance? It could also include the property tax the city pays itself for the valuable land that is being kept available.

It's not enough. Driving is always the better option for an individual, even in cities with great public transport, so you need a bit of stick as well as the carrot.

yep. People railing against cars are usually the younger ones without kids, pets, etc. So they don't understand the value of the car from their own experience, nor able to put themselves into the shoes of others due to that egoism of the youth (i've naturally been there myself :).

People parking cars on the street are simply freeloading off the taxes of people who don't do that. They should pay for what they are using, so they can make better choices.

> You need to solve this problem before you take away parking, not after.

Isn't pricing street parking the solution the parent comment proposed? It increases parking availability in the short term, while increasing demand for public transport.

> You need to solve this problem before you take away parking, not after.

If you can't change anything then you can't change anything. Replacing parking spaces with bus lanes can be a huge improvement, but obviously you have to take the parking space away before you can put the bus lane in.

> Right now people are, by and large, content with the status quo.

Boomers might be. Young people who have no hope of ever owning a home anywhere where the jobs are aren't.

This same logic applies for every single other proposal (charge money for on-street parking, etc.). Many people would not be able to afford to live where they already do if that change was done overnight.

Well, there’s a lot of people in this thread not content with the status quo.

The whole urbanism movement of the past decade is evidence of that I think.

Moreover, even if a community is happy with free parking and expensive housing within that community, it doesn’t mean that people outside that community are happy with it.

I think it’s a bit more complicated than people are happy with the status quo.

This is a great example of a specific problem with a specific solution that people use as an excuse to try and impose blanket, one-size-fits-all city-wide rules for automobile storage.

This must be why Europe just kills everyone over age 75, since it is impossible to support the elderly without 12-lane highways and subsidized gasoline.

Giving viable alternatives to driving (be that cycleways or public transport) reduces traffic, and reducing traffic makes it easier for people that actually DO need to drive motor vehicles.

>Telling them to take the bus is about as effective as telling Amazon to abandon delivery vans in favor of bicycles.

Ironic that you bring this up as an absurd example, when this is exactly what happens in dense cities with good cycling infrastructure (Holland, Denmark, etc).

This edge case that you came up with warrants a car, but is that really the reality of most cars parking in any given community?

And honestly, it’s questionable whether it warrants a car too. In Tokyo it would be perfectly fine to do those trips by public transport. My biweekly cleaner gets around by train to all the places she works at. And local delivery companies all use bicycles for last mile delivery.

Maybe that’s not viable right now, but I think that’s the point of Donald’s advocacy. By not pricing parking correctly we provide perverse incentives as a society that lead us down a vicious cycle. Free parking means more cars means less transit ridership means we need more free parking, and repeat.

This shapes our cities into places that prioritize cars over humans. High housing costs, air pollution, less mobility, less freedom.

If you price parking appropriately, you get a virtuous cycle instead. Expensive parking means less driving means more transit ridership means more free parking slots means more room for other development, etc.

This is clearly why people pay less for housing in locales like New York or San Francisco with very efficient land use than, say, rural Oklahoma.

How does down zoning lower housing costs? I'm having trouble wrapping my head around it.

Assuming you don’t believe in forced sterilization there is actually no public policy way to reduce density.

It’s just a mathematical fact. More people means on average the population density increases.

Since all solutions involve increasing density somewhere the argument actually reduces to the question of where.

Assuming you think Oregon, specifically, should be less dense or remain the same, then you are necessarily an advocate for increased density somewhere else.

So maybe tell us where?

This is entirely untrue. You are responding to a poster who has provided high-quality sources by just saying "nuh-uh".

The argument that density puts stress on people to move _towards_ that density seems to me to have the direction of causation reversed. People look at prices when they move, not density.

Housing as an investment is driven by scarcity. Commit to making housing abundant and it starts being a much less interesting investment.

If the housing isn't desirable for housing, why would it go up as an investment?

I left the area in October 2010, so maybe public transit became more popular after I was gone. I owned a home in SW Portland, about a 15-minute walk from the MAX station. That's a perfectly reasonable distance, even in the cold or rain.

I never knew where my neighbors worked, but I never saw them walking to or parking at the MAX station. None of my coworkers used it either.

For me, though, it was invaluable especially when I wanted to go out for a few drinks. And since it only ran until 10 or 11, it was the perfect excuse for not staying out too late.

Not quite, because parking requirements is one of the few issues that is high profile enough that voters remember it when it comes time to vote for city council. The people who vote in city council elections are a small minority, but they're a much bigger group than the dedicated and/or crazy folks who show up at meetings.

Does attaching a cost really make a meaningful difference? I'm paying for my trash pickup even though I'm not directly billed for it. The point if charging for public parking is more a rationing mechanism than a moral imperative. I think it's annoying to shoulder the cost on businesses which is why it's in practice being shouldered on the developers who get money from the state so large-scale I think it evens out.

I think public transport should be free, keeping on the Columbus track I have no idea why COTA even bothers to charge. They instituted a monthly price-cap that's at most $62/mo and (or at most $31 plus 50% reduction on the per-fare cost if you're broke). And while not an insignificant amount of money to the riders it's bottom-of-the-bag chip dust to COTA itself. Oh no, more people might use the nearly empty busses, the horror.

> If I live in single family housing that is adjacent to a business district and I have no driveway then street parking can be pretty efficient.

You are the one who chose the house. if you have a single family house with no driveway you self selected to not having a car. its not the other citizens in the city who forced you to buy that house and then buy a car where you had nowhere to park it. Even if there was adequate parking before and now there isn't, what gives you perpetual rights to a shared resource?

Why should other people in the city suffer for your lack of foresight?

Part of what Shoup talks about that gets less attention is actually managing parking when it gets scarce. Your reasoning about creating your own parking spot on your own property is correct. In terms of the street parking, there are various ways of managing it to ensure there are some spots free most of the time.

I'm torn on this one.

On one hand, you don't own the street in front of your house. It's public and anyone can park there. And that's very fair.

On the other hand, I've lived in suburban neighborhoods without enough parking, and they look so run down and shitty--every street looks like Fast Eddie's Used Car Lot. If I was looking for a suburban home to move into, I would probably skip a neighborhood with streets blighted with parked cars everywhere. And definitely taking a lot that used to be zoned for a single family home and dumping a 14 family apartment on it will quickly turn a neighborhood into that street parking blight.

I think you are owed two things when you buy a house:

1. The right to live in it as long as you pay your property taxes.

2. Not have its use as a residence ruined by allowing industrial or farm activity near enough that sounds or smells would affect you.

Housing is housing. If someone buys up all the lots around you and builds apartments, they should have that right. The willingness to invest that much money is a signal that people need to live there.

Homelessness in my town is also detrimental to my experience of living in my house.

>What are your opinions on zoning and re-zoning?

Burn it all!

Anything that matters is already regulated at the state level if not permitted there too. Basically nothing even slightly controversial isn't permitted locally. We could just get rid of basically all zoning and it would be mostly fine. Nobody wants to put a toxic waste processing plant or strip club in a classy neighborhood anyway because those people make poor neighbors for such an operation.

Nothing about zoning is supposed to be set in stone.

And "change" is like squeezing a balloon. If you stop it in one way, it bulges out in other ways: unaffordable housing for instance. Change still happened, just different from allowing the physical form of buildings to change.

I can't tell if this is sarcasm or not. Well done.

So you bought a place with no parking spot, now there are a bunch of other people in a place without a parking spot, but you were here first?

> We have a couple of new slum boxes

It's good to see how you honestly view apartment buildings: with condescension.

> now the street parking is gone

By "gone," I think you mean "used."

Sorry but you are wrong here, at least where I live (San Francisco), so this should not be stated as an absolute. See San Francisco Public Works Code article 15 section 706: https://codelibrary.amlegal.com/codes/san_francisco/latest/s...

“It shall be the duty of the owners of lots or portions of lots immediately adjacent to any portion of a public street, avenue, alley, lane, court, or place to maintain the sidewalks and sidewalk area, including any parking strip, parkway, automobile runway, and curb, fronting or adjacent to their property in good repair and condition. This duty shall include removal of any unpermitted structure, including but not limited to unpermitted public pay telephones installed in the sidewalk adjacent to the property. Any person who suffers injury or property damage as a legal result of the failure of the owner to so maintain the sidewalks and sidewalk areas shall have a cause of action for such injury or property damage against such property owner. The City and County of San Francisco shall have a cause of action for indemnity against such property owner for any damages it may be required to pay as satisfaction of any judgment or settlement of any claim that results from injury to persons or property as a legal result of the failure of the owner to maintain the sidewalks and sidewalk areas in accordance with this subsection (a). Failure of the owner to maintain the sidewalks and sidewalk areas as set forth in this subsection (a) also shall constitute a public nuisance.”

Not complaining. Just other people might have other needs that or they might be in a rush or maybe they would rather be warm at home enjoying their hobbies opposed to trudging 200 meters through through feet of snow. For why? To not wait for two minutes? Are we really so impatient that waiting for 2 minutes is somehow seen as a waste?