Minimum automobile parking requirements are present in virtually every local zoning code in the United States. However, they are arbitrary, unscientific, and almost universally far too high: most...
Minimum automobile parking requirements are present in virtually every local zoning code in the United States. However, they are arbitrary, unscientific, and almost universally far too high: most parking spaces are empty most of the time. The mere existence of these regulations encourages car-centric urban sprawl, which is both environmentally unsustainable and fundamentally damaging to transportation system efficiency and municipal budgets. Parking lots are inherently unproductive land uses relative to housing or businesses, so having too many of them in an urban area severely blights its economic condition. For these reasons, many cities are seeking to eliminate minimum parking requirements from their zoning codes. In doing so, they offer flexibility for land uses instead of excessively allocating land to what usually ends up being empty parking spaces.
By ending strict minimum parking requirements, the Twin Cities have been able to improve both housing affordability and our urban form. Based on evidence both local and from across the country, it’s becoming clear that this is a winning policy choice.
The case for eliminating parking requirements centers on the idea, largely popularized by scholar Donald Shoup, that minimum parking mandates don’t consistently reflect the actual demand for parking, relative to the cost of supplying it. The appropriate amount of parking will be different for every building based on its land cost, proximity to transit, and customer base, among numerous other factors.
Parking takes up a lot of space and is costly to build, whether you put it on a surface lot or in a garage (a 2021 estimate pegged the average above-ground parking structure at $27,000 per spot, and much higher if you’re digging below ground). These costs drive up rents, or else make housing projects unfeasible to build at all.
It's not like most people know what minimum parking requirements are, but some drivers worry that removing them will eliminate all off-street parking in a city. This is simply not true, as evidenced by case studies like Seattle and Buffalo (two very different cities, in different regions and with different climates, cultures, and layouts):
At the same time, eliminating parking minimums doesn’t cause off-street parking to disappear entirely. Even when apartment developers aren’t required to build parking spots, many prospective residents will still want parking (and be willing to pay for it). A world without parking requirements will still have parking, but supplied in quantities responsive to actual demand.
Yet in both instances, the majority of post-reform buildings took advantage of their new flexibility and built less parking than was previously mandated. In both cities, parking reform helped increase the overall supply of homes, reduce the cost of construction, and shift the cities toward a less car-centric design.
Likewise, data from Minneapolis shows that eliminating these requirements leads to fewer useless parking spots—because there is fundamentally not that much demand for it, and there shouldn't be. While some developers choose not to incorporate any parking into their new designs, far more incorporate some but not much: that is, they include only what residents actually want. This reasonable decision means that they don't have to spend millions of dollars building parking structures or wasting valuable urban space on asphalt lots, ultimately increasing construction efficiency and indirectly decreasing the cost of living.
Prioritizing the storage of automobiles over productive land uses (or, in the case of minimum parking requirements, the theoretical storage of automobiles: the idea of parking somewhere, or the "freedom" to do so whether or not the parking spot is literally ever used) is fundamentally detrimental to cities. A city's urban form is largely defined by its land use, and if that land use is largely for cars, rather than people, it has failed to support a level of density and alternative transportation options necessary to thrive self-sufficiently.
Parking reform isn't flashy. We're talking about very small wording changes to local regulations that basically no constituents have ever bothered to read (for that matter, neither have many politicians): going from "the city mandates X amount of parking for this use" to "the city recommends Y amount of parking for this use." The concept doesn't typically come up in mainstream headlines except when drivers who have skimmed a reform proposal complain about the principle of having less parking in a city (fears which are usually unwarranted). The effects, though very real, also aren't immediate. It can take months for developers to conceptualize a project and longer for it to get approved. However, removing these regulations is an important step toward the long-term health and sustainability of cities.
Between that and the well made bike lanes, the people mover, and the skywalks downtown, Minneapolis was surprisingly easier to commute/live in in spite of the absurdly harsh weather.
Between that and the well made bike lanes, the people mover, and the skywalks downtown, Minneapolis was surprisingly easier to commute/live in in spite of the absurdly harsh weather.
Minimum automobile parking requirements are present in virtually every local zoning code in the United States. However, they are arbitrary, unscientific, and almost universally far too high: most parking spaces are empty most of the time. The mere existence of these regulations encourages car-centric urban sprawl, which is both environmentally unsustainable and fundamentally damaging to transportation system efficiency and municipal budgets. Parking lots are inherently unproductive land uses relative to housing or businesses, so having too many of them in an urban area severely blights its economic condition. For these reasons, many cities are seeking to eliminate minimum parking requirements from their zoning codes. In doing so, they offer flexibility for land uses instead of excessively allocating land to what usually ends up being empty parking spaces.
It's not like most people know what minimum parking requirements are, but some drivers worry that removing them will eliminate all off-street parking in a city. This is simply not true, as evidenced by case studies like Seattle and Buffalo (two very different cities, in different regions and with different climates, cultures, and layouts):
Likewise, data from Minneapolis shows that eliminating these requirements leads to fewer useless parking spots—because there is fundamentally not that much demand for it, and there shouldn't be. While some developers choose not to incorporate any parking into their new designs, far more incorporate some but not much: that is, they include only what residents actually want. This reasonable decision means that they don't have to spend millions of dollars building parking structures or wasting valuable urban space on asphalt lots, ultimately increasing construction efficiency and indirectly decreasing the cost of living.
Prioritizing the storage of automobiles over productive land uses (or, in the case of minimum parking requirements, the theoretical storage of automobiles: the idea of parking somewhere, or the "freedom" to do so whether or not the parking spot is literally ever used) is fundamentally detrimental to cities. A city's urban form is largely defined by its land use, and if that land use is largely for cars, rather than people, it has failed to support a level of density and alternative transportation options necessary to thrive self-sufficiently.
Parking reform isn't flashy. We're talking about very small wording changes to local regulations that basically no constituents have ever bothered to read (for that matter, neither have many politicians): going from "the city mandates X amount of parking for this use" to "the city recommends Y amount of parking for this use." The concept doesn't typically come up in mainstream headlines except when drivers who have skimmed a reform proposal complain about the principle of having less parking in a city (fears which are usually unwarranted). The effects, though very real, also aren't immediate. It can take months for developers to conceptualize a project and longer for it to get approved. However, removing these regulations is an important step toward the long-term health and sustainability of cities.
See also: How much of your city is parking lots?.
Thanks. I mix up the syntax a lot.
Between that and the well made bike lanes, the people mover, and the skywalks downtown, Minneapolis was surprisingly easier to commute/live in in spite of the absurdly harsh weather.