PARKING REFORM: Intro

Draft Part 2 of who knows how many...



INTRODUCTION
In ten years, what will the City of Dallas look like? How about in twenty? Fifty? One hundred? The answer in the near-term is far easier to imagine than far into the future. That unpredictability ought to give us some insight into the process of zoning and coding for the City.

The United Nations defined sustainability as taking care of the needs of present generations without compromising the ability of future generations to meet theirs as well. In many ways, our building and zoning codes should represent a similar logic in order to rectify the mistakes of previous generations to be more accommodating for our needs and more adaptable for the future. They must achieve the goals set forth by the City yet be adaptable to prevent the institutionalization of what might have been one generation’s preferences instilling an inertia at the expense of another’s.

In a period of economic and general transition for people and their cities, now is the time to revisit codes cemented in place for so long and mold the underlying “genetic” codes of cities for the functional urban form we desire. Geographer Richard Florida similarly refers to the present version of these periods of varying degree of trauma as the Great Reset.

Urban Genetics, the underlying code and resultant physical form

Howard Bloom, popular science author and neurobiologist, calls these recessionary lulls the growing pains of shedding one form of living, that which is no longer useful for another new way of being, existing, and often, a yet to be determined one. According to Bloom and countless other urban theorists, our cities are the physical manifestation of our economies, meaning our phenotype, which with an understanding of genetics is directly connected to our genotype, or underlying genetic code. To get the cities we want, we must alter the genetic code of cities.

Our current challenge is unpredictability: what if we rewire the City’s code incorrectly? The worst thing to do is the obvious, to stick with the status quo or the comfortable. If Bloom is to be believed, we do not yet know what the future city will be because it is yet to emerge from the competition to replace the failing version of the existing. However, it is equally bad is to code a potentially incorrect prediction. We need to allow for flexibility and the determination of potential new urban phenotypes to battle it out and determine the optimal direction for our City. Lesson: Don't code to specifics.

PARKING REFORM: Executive Summary

(This is a snippet of the overall paper that checks in somewhere around 6,000 words and 11 pages. Putting it out there for crowd-sourced review and another chance to look at it in something other than Word, to give myself fresh eyes, so to speak.)



Part 1
Executive summary

A common solution to parking problems affecting American cities is often to convert to a market-based pricing approach. While this is appropriate in some locations, a strictly market-based approach works when curb parking is underpriced and overcrowded, however when there is plentiful off-street parking, the problem is the very code demanding excessive spaces.

As Professor Donald Shoup of UCLA writes in his paper on cruising, "Cities can therefore eliminate cruising either by charging market prices for curb parking or by requiring enough off-street spaces to reduce the price of off-street parking to zero. The price of curb parking is one of the few policy variables that cities control directly, but almost all American cities have chosen the wrong policy: requiring plentiful off-street parking rather than charge fair market prices for scarce curb parking."

However, rather than only one problem existing in Dallas, it is not that simple. Simply switching all parking to market is not enough. Expecting different results by following past policies or principles is the definition of folly. This paper intends to point out the multitude of negative outcomes for the city produced by the current parking ordinances as well as a suggested road map for guiding revision.

There are two general parking scenarios emerging in Dallas. Using Jan Gehl’s terminology these are the Invaded City or the Abandoned City. An Invaded area is one where demand to be there remains high enough where visitors often search endlessly for free parking and crowd residential neighborhood streets. In Dallas, some of these areas include West Village, Lower Greenville, and Bishop Arts.

Abandoned places are areas where walking and public life has become almost completely nonexistent due to excessive parking. Downtown Dallas was first invaded by automobiles in the 1950s, only to eventually be abandoned due to reactionary measures. Today, much of downtown remains abandoned although Main Street area seems to be on its way back towards invaded. Neither of which is ideal or acceptable.

If thought about thoroughly and amended strategically and creatively, a new parking code will solve both problems. Ultimately, this report suggests the differentiation of regional centers and local centers from the rest of the development code and make special provisions to these overlays for parking and transportation directives associated with the goals and principles of the area as outlined in the Comprehensive Plan.

Guest Post: Charlotte Parking Wars

Here in Dallas, we have had a similar problem. Not with a greenway, but parking for DART stations taking up spaces in a shopping center and remaining all day, while the car's owner works in downtown.

A friend writes:

This was on our local news last night. I thought you might enjoy it. We built a greenway(+1 for CLT) in a place where it's mainly accessible by car(-1 for CLT) so people began parking overflow in a shopping plaza. The shopping plaza patrons are mad b/c they can't park in the closest spot to WalMart. The solution being proposed is constructing a new parking lot, just for the greenway(-1 for CLT). By my calculations building this new greenway is going to have a net negative effect on Charlotte. Which to me contradicts the original reason for building the greenway?

Here is the link to the news story:

4-Mile Creek Greenway is an outdoor lovers paradise for hikers, bikers, dog walkers, and people who love to run and have fun. But, the problem is parking at the entrance is limited and many find it convenient to park across Bevington Place at the Shops at Piper Glen which is limited itself. "Sometimes it's just like somebody took all the cars and just stirred them up, it's crazy and can be a nightmare, especially on the weekends." said frequent shopper Nancy Brimberry. Brenda Schuler adds, "it's too compact it's too small and and there's so many accidents in here."

Here is where I think it is important to remember the old Donald Shoup study that there are four surface parking spaces built in this country for every car. Furthermore, the Piper Glen area where this parking war is taking place is very suburban. Recall that the quote above says it is for hikers, bikers, dog walkers, joggers, etc. All of these people are DRIVING to the green space.

In a drive-to-everywhere world, this will ALWAYS be a problem.