The Parking Fetish

"Does different color brick make me look shorter & expensive?" Answer: Um. No.Our son went away to camp for two weeks so like any kid-free couple, my husband and I spent a night of torrid, passionate, steamy….conversation about parking.

The latest parking obsession is the feud in California between the State Chapter of the American Planning Association (Cal APA) and Donald Shoup.   Cal APA asked its members to oppose a bill (AB 904) that would relieve minimum parking requirements parking in transit-oriented development project areas.  Mr. Shoup sent a widely circulated letter back to Cal APA, expressing disappointment with the organization.   Professor Shoup sees AB 904 as a “parking disarmament policy” which will let cities allow parking prices near transit and remove minimum (and costly) standards.  However, Cal APA sees AB 904 as a one-size-fits-all mandate. 

On July 3, the bill was pulled from a Committee agenda, but not before the spat hit the blogwaves, including  Streetsblog  and Market Urbanism.

So on to passionate and steamy.   I told my husband I actually side with Cal APA on this one.  I’ve written before on how and why Arlington, Virginia – home to many planning innovations – actually keeps it minimums on the books (more below).

My husband, on the other hand, sides with Professor Shoup.  Aaron travels all over the country in his job, and visits lots of medium-sized sprawly cities.  In his work negotiating with local officials, he notes flexibility is worthless because cities looking for a quick buck will always flex to the cheap and the sprawl.   He’d actually like to see parking maximums as well, which was not part of AB 904.

As the night wore on, it became clear we were talking about two different place types.  High dollar TOD doesn’t happen in medium sized towns, so I’ll give him the standards argument.

 But high dollar TOD is what’s on the table, and it seems like the Cal APA-Shoup feud exposes a couple of points:

• Rigorously enforced minimum parking requirements and how outdated minimum parking requirements are flexed as a negotiating tool are two vastly different things.     
• While the gist of the conversation should be TOD planning, it is not.  It’s about parking.  Sure bad parking policy can drive bad planning outcomes.  But overwhleming focus on one aspect of planning like parking can marginalize other planning needs that are as important, if not more important.

Take Arlington.  They use their nasty old minimum requirements like a BOSS.  During recent attempts to get rid of parking minimums, it became clear that the county would give away its ability to negotiate the interlinking aspects of neighborhood design.   Negotiation is key because the issues change over time and place to place.  When I entered Arlington activism in the early 90’s, parks were highest priority.  Affordable housing rose in prominence over the years.  Streetscape and sidewalk improvements that make living without a car possible in the first place are a constant need that needs funding.  Architecture, once hideous, has improved.  Here is a longer post on Arlington, the site plan review process and parking.

The ability to leverage minimums is not just an Arlington quirk where T-3.5 bumps up against T-6.  In a review of its station area policies, Charlotte N.C. hired the Lawrence Group to review its TOD policies and neighborhood compatibility.  In the report, titled “Review of Charlotte’s PED and TOD Districts for Neighborhood Compatibility,” a must-read discussion (Page 8) comes to the same conclusion: keep your minimums, but signal they are a tool.  Don’t give away your bargaining position when setting parking policies.

I realize there is now a great deal of support for streamlining developer requirements for TODs.  Setting standards and getting rid of extraneous process are seen as critical for supporting smart growth.  But AB 904 would not have only eliminated minimums, it would have deep-sixed the strongest negotiating card cities have to orchestrate a dizzying array of planning goals and lessen impacts.  One of the reasons the parking space avoidance card is so strong is (1) unlike other quality of life amenities, spaces are easy to quantify in dollars and (2) those spaces are expensive.   Yes TODs must reign in valuable space for people, not parking and yes, Mr. Shoup offers tons of innovative ways to do so.  In some cases, blanket elimination of minimums will work.  But not all - and that is at the core of the feud.

The bottom line is planners should not be after the best parking plan (or stormwater district or complete streets....).  We should be in the business of making great places that thrive over time.  Perhaps we have less a parking fetish than a streamlining obsession?  Should some Planning Departments be trusted with negotiations and others not?  Sounds like my next night out.

New Publication on Density and Neighborhoods

Example of stepdown heights between taller buildings and SFH in Arlington VA

Hi All - I am the author of the latest Zoning Practice, a publication of the American Planning Association.  The August 2012 edition is called "Density and the Planning Edge."

I've long been frustrated with planning at this edge (having started my planning career in Arlington as an activist living on this edge but supportive of Metro-oriented density).  My main complaints are:

• There are legitimate concerns on livability that can be better addressed if included at the front end of the planning process: noise, circulation, design, restaurant smells, parks, drainage, parking, garbage pickup, traffic, loading and deliveries, crosswalks
• There are also long term impacts that can be better managed when maintenance and management are front-end topics. 
• There is no organized, central repository where local decision makers, developers and homeowners can go to see policies, stipulations, maintenance agreements, photos, plans and graphics that have worked (or fell short) in other places.
• If this is a top reason why good redevelopment and density do not take place, why are we not addressing as a planning imperative? 

I will be blogging on some really great case studies I found, but will also be on the stump to create a bigger, more helpful project.  Let me know if you are interested, or send changemakers my way (lisa[at]nisenson.net].  Any ideas of who to approach as partners or funders also welcome.

You can see the official blurb at  http://www.planning.org/zoningpractice/

To order a copy, mail a $10 check to

Zoning Practice Back Issues
American Planning Association
205 N Michigan Ave
Suite 1200
Chicago, IL 60601

A-park-olypse Arlington - what hath Donald Shoup wrought?

I have a confession.  In my early planning years, I wrote tons of policy recommendations on removing barriers to better development outcomes, including parking. I am a dyed in the wool Shoupista
But lately I am wondering if we have festishized policy to the point of missing the how-to of getting really good urban planning. 

This installment is about Arlington - or rather hub-bub over parking for a new development project that might unintentionally set new precedent for long-term policy.  But before we get to the hub-bub, a little history about the corridor.

In the 1970's Arlington Virginia made a now-famous decision to pay for undergrounding the subway corridor (because of economic reasons, not grammatical purity). The County made a deal with local residents: if you agree to put LOTS of density along this spine, we will cap and taper heights down to the neighborhoods, and set a boundary across which density will not jump.  Less advertised is the deal to also initiate a process called site plan review.   The deal goes like this: developers could go right ahead and build under their as-of-right suburban zoning, or come to table and hammer out details of their project.  Needless to say, the density allowances mean most developers come to the table to talk design review, regulatory relief, and community benefit proffers. The photo below shows this subway spine - S.F. means single-family (for more info - read Kaid Benfield’s post on the corridor here).

Over the years, parking has become the highest stakes element in the process, mainly because relief from the as-of-right parking requirements can save hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars (because underground parking is expensive).  When I sat in on such negotiations, the process became a kabuki dance of finding the right mix of proffer and relief from the strictures of out of date zoning.  At times, we neighborhoods overplayed our hand, and others, developers would throw in extras.  That's how site plan works.

So what's the kerfuffle now?  It looks like there is a push to replace the out-of-date parking ratios with a suite of new parking policies.  For example, maximum parking ratios would be put in place.  For those new to the issue, most suburban zoning codes require minimum parking ratios, for example a minimum of four spaces per 1000 square feet of retail space.  The developer can add more, and in fact often do.  Maximum allotments say "you can only build this many, you can build fewer spaces, or pay a hefty price for spaces above the allotment."  In Arlington, car ownership is really low, due to a combination of the subway, great bus service and the land use mix.  

But here's the problem.  If you take out the old ratios, you take out the biggest leverage you have to get and keep developers at the table.  In the negotiation stage, proffer funds are often sought to improve the walk, bike and transit amenities that support a car-free lifestyle (and as a result make lowered parking space requirements work in the first place).  Site plan review is also needed because, as the photo reveals, the transition from ultra-high density to single family neighborhoods takes place in a matter of blocks.  Making this work is a delicate, negotiated process that takes place building by building.  Parking is not the only objective to work out.  Neighbors have been able to get stipulations on operations that make life next to a 10 story building not just tolerable, but enjoyable. The same goes for design objectives, parks, trees, and historic preservation, though parking can be used as the lever to get the mix of amenities right depending on the particular location in the corridor.

I know Arlington is extremely proud of its smart growth credentials; having old suburban parking ratios on the books just seems to run counter to having a great smart growth program.  But here is the kicker: the “barrier” language is actually essential to getting smart growth, not stopping it. The key to smart growth success is not just in code, but in negotiations: the higher the ratios, the stronger the hand.  If you are saving a developer $50,000 it’s one thing, but $2 million? Why would anyone choose to water down their bargaining position?

And the timing is befuddling.  While some cities are changing codes to become more business friendly, Arlington doesn’t need it, at least not in the corridor.  In fact, businesses locate to the corridor because of the transit and walk investments. I've been told that there are plenty of infrastructure funds now, but we are talking about a policy change that could extend into a future with fewer public dollars.  In a state like Virginia at this political point in time - there is no going back, no do-overs.   

For my colleagues out there on the stump for better code language, this is not a jab.  Rather, I think we need to get a better hold on the definition of success:  is it neat policies and “clean code,” or is it successful smart growth and redevelopment projects?   They are not always the same thing and as this post points out, cities and counties can retain older code not because they are bad at what they do, but because they are really good.