Quote:
Originally Posted by whatnext
IMHO the 1,300 parking spots for 2,800 units is extremely naive. Yes, yes, I know it's beloved of planners, but its not reflective of reality. Given what the units' price points will be, its very likely owners will want to keep at least one car. The faulty assumption is that 50% of the buyers/renters are going to work downtown or maybe at the airport.
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First of all developers will obviously like this, they can charge less for their product and earn higher profit margins so long as their sales and marketing team convinces buyers that they don't need a parking space.
The problem is that cities with significantly more units then parking spots generally end up viewing this as a significant problem. People generally are poor at planing for the future, people's view of short term gain versus long term costs is skewed. They will happily save a few dollars today not thinking about how much their life circumstances may change 10 or 20 years down the road. Having less parking may seem like a good idea until you end up with less parking then demand, and at that point fixing this becomes a major problem that many cities have experienced and continue to experience today.
Personally I think there should be one stall for every unit in all developments, its as much a city amenity as it is a asset for the owners.
*Keep in mind when I say this I am not saying a parking stall MUST be used as a parking stall, its still a usable space that can be used for any number of other uses. Based on demand you can convert parking stalls to other uses, or back from other uses to parking stalls.
Lets list the uses we can convert them to:
1) mini storage, (residential or public)
2) work shops
3) hydroponic farming
4) some forms of light industrial
5) recreational / bowling / etc.
6) transformer station / utility hub
7) gallery
8) educational or other institutional uses
9) with modern technology even residential (ie windows will not always be needed with the use of modern up and coming display screen technology...cheap livable units, maybe not even cheap actually...future solution for affordability issues?)
10) any other number of uses.
The point is parking stalls can be converted to other uses, but you cant necessarily convert other uses to parking stalls. We should be a little more creative and allow for some flexibility instead of basically handicapping our selves.
my two cents.