Quote:
Originally Posted by Kitchissippi
The blame lies on current zoning by-laws. It is virtually impossible to build a house without a parking spot. The bulk of zoning regulations were formulated specifically around parking (for example setbacks are usually at least a car length), which means any site plan has to consider where a car is placed first (i.e., a garage) before the rest of the dwelling is designed. Creating a new suburb with transit from the beginning will not change these rules, and since you cannot put walkable amenities in the middle of a green field with a snap of a finger, you'll still end up with a neighbourhood that maybe will take transit in rush hour but otherwise will use a car.
It's an undeniable fact that suburban transit is periodic and unidirectional. If a suburb were truly successful, then transit would be internal, supporting movement within the community just like the urban model. This is why the the old N-S LRT model would have been nothing but an expensive express bus service.
I think you've bought into the idealism that public transit by itself can modify social behaviour. In reality, our public transit system needs to be modified to cater better to the people that already have already acquired that lifestyle and have chosen to live in walkable communities that are currently underserved or heavily affected by the volume of suburban commuters.
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Of course, everything is more complicated that it appears, however, there is also a chicken and egg scenario here. Nobody will use transit if it isn't available or if it is poor quality. When used, it will also be mainly unidirectional commuting. However, we are also seeing employment moving to the suburbs more and more and with no useful transit, of course we keep re-enforcing the use of cars continually. This applies even if you live in a central neighbourhood and your job moves out of downtown. You end up needing a car or dealing with a pathetic level of public transit. What I am saying is that our transit investments are not reflecting our changing travel patterns nor is it considering some of the congestion that is building up where transit may become a useful alternative if it was fast.
If we want to improve public transit and see ridership growth, we cannot keep investing in the same people over and over again. My complaint with the current plan is that we are spending a ton of money to serve the exact same route that already has very good transit service. Sure, there are other reasons, mainly downtown congestion, which is very valid, but we are also sucking money out of even central neighbourhood transit improvements as well. When do you think the Carling Avenue streetcar will be built? This will likely not take place for decades now.
The problem with your specific issue with parking is that it is almost impossible to deal with unless we implement transit improvements so that we offer an alternative. As it stands, there is very few areas of the city where you can live without a car and still maintain a lifestyle that has a degree of convenience. We have not adopted the frequent transit service that exists in fairly large areas of Toronto and Montreal.
And we are not considering other novel ideas such as another O-Train away from that typical downtown corridor, which proved more successful than anybody anticipitated despite the naysayers at the time.