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Tuesday, March 22, 2005
Free parking costs more than you think, author says
Free parking not only isn't free, it's darned expensive and it's ruining the nation's cities, according to book released yesterday at the American Planning Association's national convention in San Francisco.
Policies that require overconstruction of off-street parking spaces and subsidize on-street parking are fueling higher housing prices, extreme automobile dependence, extravagant energy use, rapid urban sprawl and environmental degradation, said Donald Shoup, a professor of urban planning at UCLA and author of "The High Cost of Free Parking."
Free parking "encourages people to drive wherever they go because they know they can park free when they get there," Shoup said. "Most of our current (parking) policies are exactly the opposite of what they should be."
The planning association, whose members include 30,000 urban planners, published Shoup's book. The book is a "wake-up call to think about how we approach parking," said Paul Farmer, the organization's executive director.
In 2002, as much as $374 billion was spent nationally to subsidize off-street parking -- roughly as much as the government spent on Medicare or national defense that year, according to the book.
"The financial costs are enormous, but so are many of the hidden costs," Shoup said.
For example, cities typically require the construction of four off-street parking spaces for every 1,000 square feet of office space, Shoup said. Since each parking space takes up about 300 square feet, the net result is 20 percent more space for cars than people, he said.
Parking requirements reduce the land available for housing and drive up the cost of housing, Shoup said.
Other items from Shoup's book:
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