Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Reducing parking spaces

[Katie Henry (katie-henry]

My former community has the best of all worlds -- it has no on-site parking at 
all but is located next door to a county parking garage, so people with cars 
buy monthly county parking permits. No maintenance costs to the community, no 
squabbling over spaces. It's great.

A few comments:

1. Your choice of words ("discouraging" car use vs. "encouraging" alternative 
forms of transit) sounds judgmental and smacks of social engineering. It makes 
me wonder if your community will also want to "discourage" me from watching TV 
or eating meat or whatever other activities it disapproves of. I drive my car 
maybe 10 miles a week, but I'm not giving it up, thanks.

2. Insufficient or difficult parking will be a dealbreaker for some future 
buyers. Is that a risk you're willing to take? When my former community was 
forming, there was a brief period where we thought we would not be able to use 
the country parking garage, leaving us to scramble for scarce on-street 
parking. Probably well over half of the members would have bailed on the 
project if that had happened.

3. I think that charging for parking is a great idea. Let the members with cars 
bear the cost of owning the land dedicated to parking and maintaining the lot 
(paving, striping, fencing, lighting, fixing the drive gate, etc.). 

Charging as a deterrent, however, not so great. What about handicapped 
residents? Well, of course you can't charge them. And senior citizens? No, 
can't charge them either. The family with a kid who needs to be driven to a 
special school every day? The nurse who works shifts when the buses aren't 
running? The plumber who makes a living with his truck? Is it fair to penalize 
them for car ownership when they have no viable alternative? Will there be a 
"parking panel" that makes value judgments about residents and whether their 
need for a car is legitimate? Or how do you see that playing out?

Katie Henry




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Reducing parking spaces   <– Date –>    <– Thread –> 
From: Doug Hanvey (hanveygmail.com) 
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 11:13:16 -0700 (PDT) 
Our forming community would like to minimize the number of parking spaces
per unit.  We've been thinking of ways to discourage on-site parking (we
live in a bike-friendly town near a bus stop). One idea was to charge
residents for the use of parking spaces. Does anyone have any experience
with this, or suggestions for other unique ways of reducing/discouraging
car use, and thus minimizing the need for parking spaces? Doug Hanvey 
Bloomington Cohousing Bloomington, Indiana