[counterpoint1]

It's fascinating to see the massive propaganda campaign ridesharing companies are launching against parking spots.

You do all understand that's where the massive wave of articles about changing building codes and zoning rules to get rid of parking, both public and privately owned, is coming from, right? Uber, Lyft, etc would love to make it hard or impossible to use a privately owned car in urban areas.

Getting rid of the requirement to put parking will mostly just lower everyone's quality of life- residents will take up all the street parking, making it harder for shoppers to access stores, restaurants, etc, making brick and mortar stores even further disadvantaged versus online retailers while also causing more headaches as businesses are forced to actively police their parking areas against use by non-customers.

But it'll be great news for ride sharing companies, as millions of people find themselves unable to own a car while living in American cities which are entirely designed to require car travel.

[eesmith]

Most of the people who drive for Uber use privately owned cars, do they not? It seems like any restriction would hinder them. In my city, only registered cabs are allowed on the streets of the main shopping areas.

"making it harder for shoppers to access stores"

The density of people walking or on bike is much higher than in a car. Fewer required parking spaces means it's easier to walk from store to store. Remember, most parking lots are empty because they are designed for the busy time of the year. Most parking requirements are per-building, not per-area, so there's even more wasted space.

That wasted space raises rents for brick and mortar stores in a way that online retailers don't have to worry about.

"businesses are forced to actively police their parking areas against use by non-customers"

Nonsense. Get rid of the parking requirement and those businesses which don't want to police their parking areas simply won't have a parking area. While if there's really demand, parking lots and parking garages are a way to shift the costs to those who do want to police their parking arenas.

"while living in American cities which are entirely designed to require car travel"

That is true. But the cities can't change if the current parking restrictions stay. Let the market decide who pays - not some central planning committee.

As often pops up here, The Netherlands up until the 1970s was also increasingly designed around cars. With deliberate effort, and over time, that's changed. "Nijmegen’s center city wasn’t always car-free—cue grainy footage of midcentury sedans cruising past charming steepled rooftops. “The main square used to be a parking lot,” Sjors Van Duren, the program director of Velo-City, tells Clarence Eckerson, the film’s director. But since the 1970s, the city has replaced the downtown’s auto-centric streets with pedestrian pathways and bike lanes." - https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2017/07/it-takes-more...

[mtalantikite]

Or maybe we could finally invest in public transit, build protected bike lanes, and move towards having more than just a couple cities in the United States that are designed for humans to walk in.

[rayiner]

There is no conceivable market failure here that would require regulation of parking spaces. The market will build the amount of parking people want. If the amount of parking goes down it'll be because the land is valued more highly for other uses.

[closeparen]

Zoning and height limits are experiencing no such liberalization. Previously we had a decent equilibrium system: low density but also a system of transportation well suited to low density.

Now that system of transportation is being decommissioned, but we're still stuck with low density.

How many hours of productivity must employers lose to their workers' long commutes? Yet the market has not provided us with anything faster.

[eesmith]

"Previously we had a decent equilibrium system"

The system we had was not in equilibrium because:

1) The cost of maintaining the old system was predicated on a continuous growth which hasn't occurred. This is the "Growth Ponzi Scheme" - https://www.strongtowns.org/the-growth-ponzi-scheme/ .

2) the Baby Boomers are now reaching retirement age. As they get older, they will be less able to drive, making it difficult for them to live in low density areas even if there were no infrastructure problems.

What does mandatory minimum parking have to do with workers' long commutes? Presumably if employee time is important to the employer then the employer will pay for parking spaces even if there were no minimum parking requirements.

[closeparen]

If we can't even afford to maintain roads that serve our sprawling zoning schemes, why on earth would we be able to afford any of the alternatives (rail, etc) within our sprawling zoning scheme?

You cannot "fix" symptoms like car use without fixing the underlying problems of car dependence.

Living in a car dependent built environment without the ability to use a car is worse than the status quo, is the point. That's the world we're heading for if we remove parking but continue to resist gentrification and upzoning.

[eesmith]

Do you agree with me that the existing system is not and was not in equilibrium?

If you disagree then this exchange will go nowhere, unless you can convince me otherwise. I think the evidence is overwhelmingly against you.

A current approach to reduce the Ponzi road scheme is to switch to unpaved roads and narrower paved roads. This reduces maintenance cost, though people don't like it because it means they need to go slower. (Which also makes it safer.) It also helps shift the balance between denser housing, vs. the sparse housing available if everyone assume there will be fast transit.

As I pointed out in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14801413 , other countries have switched away from car dependency. It's not like it's impossible, nor am I proposing a simple "fix" for car use. Removing or reducing mandatory parking requirements is one one aspect of a much larger systematic rethink that we need.

Your comments about resisting "gentrification and upzoning" seem to be about a different topic. I'm all for upzoning, and 'resist gentrification' is a very broad topic including solutions which have nothing to do with city planning.

[closeparen]

I am categorically not interested in the idea that freeways cost too much, because public transit (at the level of speed, frequency, capacity, and comfort that would be competitive with driving) also costs too much.

>It also helps shift the balance between denser housing, vs. the sparse housing available if everyone assume there will be fast transit.

This is a fallacy. The limitations on housing density are driven by residents of the urban core and inner suburbs. It doesn't matter to them how bad transportation is for people who can only afford the outer suburbs. Increasing the pain of living in low-density outer suburbs will not create more housing in the urban core and inner suburbs.

[eesmith]

I'll explain the last statement. I mean that gentrification occurs even in places like Copenhagen and Amsterdam with no required parking spaces.

Two ways to slow gentrification are to limit the increase in rental rates, and increase the power of the tenant's union to veto changes that the landlord might wish. I don't believe these are typically part of city planning, though I can see how they might be included.

[tmnvix]

> It's fascinating to see the massive propaganda campaign ridesharing companies are launching against parking spots.

> You do all understand that's where the massive wave of articles about changing building codes and zoning rules to get rid of parking, both public and privately owned, is coming from, right?

Some of it, sure. But I think you are making too big of a claim there. There are a lot of other groups and individuals that would like to see fewer cars in densely populated areas.