San Diego Removes Some Commercial Parking Requirements

"San Diego took the bold and controversial step Tuesday of wiping out parking requirements for businesses in many neighborhoods to accelerate efforts to make the city less car-reliant and more climate-friendly," reports David Garrick for The San Diego Union-Tribune.

The new parking requirements will affect businesses located near public transit or in small plazas near residential areas, according to Garrick.

This is not the first wave of parking reforms for the city of San Diego. After raising the possibility in 2018, the city began the process of unbundling parking in 2019, eventually approving an ordinance that eliminated parking requirements for new condominium and apartment complexes in neighborhoods near mass transit in March of that year. The city started to examine the possibility of removing parking requirements for some commercial developments in June of this year.

The parking requirements approved this week apply both to new and existing business. According to Garrick: "New businesses in those areas would no longer have to provide any parking spaces for customers or staff. And existing businesses could immediately transform their parking spots into outdoor dining or extra retail space."

The source article includes soundbites to encapsulate the political debate that preceded this week's City Council's vote.