Parking Requirements

Parking Sign

Mapping the End of Parking Minimums

The high cost of free parking is almost, but not quite, common knowledge. Many, but not all, people realize the pernicious effects of parking requirements. A map can help illustrate this spreading awareness.

November 25, 2015 - Strong Towns

Skytrain Over Parking Lot, Surrey Central

Parking Requirements at TOD Projects Remain Stubbornly Out of Sync

Transit Oriented Development projects around the country are still facing suburban-style parking requirements.

October 30, 2015 - The Dallas Morning News

Fayetteville Ends Minimum Parking Requirements for Commercial Uses

Fayetteville, Arkansas, home to the University of Arkansas and neighbor to Bentonville, home of Walmart, has taken a national leadership role in parking policy by ending minimum parking requirements for non-residential uses.

October 8, 2015 - Fayetteville Flyer

Chicago Approves Big Expansion of TOD Ordinance

Ten times more land in Chicago is now designated for transit oriented development—affording new development reduced parking requirements, density bonuses for affordable housing, and new strength for the city's Pedestrian Street design regulations.

September 30, 2015 - Chi.Streetsblog

New York City Construction

Can Reduced Parking Requirements Generate Too Much Development Competition?

A new argument has appeared in the ongoing debate about parking requirements. A university in a college town objected to reduced parking requirements on the grounds that it would make the city too attractive to developers.

September 30, 2015 - CityLab

Congestion as an Economic—Not an Engineering—Problem

Thinking about congestion as an economic problem generates new solutions for the problem as well as a response to accusations of social engineering.

September 29, 2015 - Urban Kchoze

Parking Sign Blue

Three Parking Solutions for Three Growing Cities

As a new wave of people flood cities to live, work, and play, many arrive on four wheels: cars, which are creating massive headaches for city planners and drivers.

September 29, 2015 - Elevation DC

Parking Requirements Among Changes in a Big Week for Planning in New York

Streetsblog NYC reviews new zoning and development rules proposed by the de Blasio Administration and finds incremental progress, not a major breakthrough, for parking policy.

September 28, 2015 - StreetsBlog NYC

Proposed Chicago TOD Ordinance: Increase Density, Eliminate Parking Requirements

Mayor Rahm Emanuel announced an update of the city's 2013 transit oriented development ordinance. The new version of the ordinance would have a sweeping effect on the land uses around transit stations in Chicago.

July 28, 2015 - Metropolitan Planning Council - The Connector

Parking, Density, and Affordable Housing in California

A bill to reduce parking minimums for residential or mixed-use developments that include affordable units passed a key Senate committee. AB 744 amends the state's density bonus law, itself controversial, that incentivizes building affordable housing.

July 16, 2015 - Streetsblog California

Detaching the Family Car from Single-Family Housing

As parking reform takes to multi-family housing, the detached single family home has largely escaped discussion. Should it? Seattle (of course) is taking the lead. Also, is all of Minneapolis ready to eliminate parking minimums along transit lines?

July 14, 2015 - Streetsblog Network

Minneapolis Riverfront

Minneapolis Ends Parking Requirements for Transit-Adjacent Developments

Minneapolis took a large leap forward last week by approving a plan that would reduce parking requirements for transit-adjacent developments in a huge swath of the city—not just downtown.

July 13, 2015 - Minneapolis Star Tribune

New York City Parking

New York City Proposes Parking Requirement Overhaul

The New York Department of City Planning is working on an overhaul of its parking requirements with the potential to impact hundreds of developments.

March 10, 2015 - Capital New York

1954 Report Explains a lot About Parking Requirements, Shopping Centers

Historic planning documents, like those found in the APA's Planning Advisory Service, are full of lessons about how past planning doctrines failed their intentions, and it's always a good time for planners to re-evaluate their antecedents.

March 3, 2015 - Strong Towns

Bike Parking Minimums Updated in Washington D.C.

Washington D.C. recently revised bike parking requirements for new or rehabilitated residential buildings, building on precedents first set in 2007.

December 12, 2014 - Wash Cycle

Database Reveals Bay Area's Parking Waste

A new tool from TransForm shows where parking is underutilized in the Bay Area, even finding wasted space in a city as notorious for parking difficulties as San Francisco.

September 24, 2014 - Next City

Empty Parking Lot

How '9x18' Parking Spaces Could Solve Affordable Housing

The "9x18" proposal by the Institute for Public Architecture provides a lesson in the relationship between parking requirements and the cost of housing.

September 15, 2014 - New York Times

Architects Design Fix For New York's Retro Parking Requirements

The "9x18" design team (named after the dimensions of a standard parking space) has evaluated and reimagined New York's parking regulations so they reflect actual parking demand and support affordable housing goals.

July 30, 2014 - Architizer

Vancouver Could Remove Parking Minimums for Condo Developments

Vancouver’s Transportation 2040 plan allowed for the easing of parking minimums for residential developments in parts of the city, and now city planners are beginning to explore where and how condos can be built without parking.

March 21, 2014 - The Province

Boston Mayoral Candidates Talk Livable Streets, But Can They Walk the Walk?

At a forum held this week, Boston mayoral candidates demonstrated their fluency in the language of transportation alternatives and livable communities. But ideas for meaningful policy changes were largely missing, says Boston Streets.

September 18, 2013 - Boston Streets

FREE Course: Walkable City 1: Why Walkability?

After describing his path towards focusing on walkability as the essence of good planning, Jeff Speck marches through his five principal reasons for making more walkable places.

Reinventing Malls: Planning Alchemy—Turning Gray Fields Into Gold

The course focuses on the opportunities and imperatives that shape reinvention of mall sites.

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