Tag: parking management

without parking reform, Sac General Plan will fail

Dan AllisonLeave a comment

If the City of Sacramento General Plan 2040 update is approved, with its very weak language about parking management, it is almost guaranteed that the objectives of the entire plan will fail, because parking is such a key aspect of how our transportation system and built environment look and function. Parking must be reformed, and the reform must be transformative and immediate. Vague language about what might happen in the future, in the 16 years of the plan, is pretty much a guarantee that not much of anything will happen. The city has strongly resisted proactively managing parking, and the General Plan would continue this resistance. [Since I refer to the Mobility Element of the General Plan so much, I have extracted those 30 pages here. However, to really understand how a lack of parking reform will harm everything else, you will have to refer to the rest of the plan.]

The goals and policies Mobility element is the place where most language about parking resides. Curb management, items M-2.10 through M-2.13 (page 8-17), and Parking Management M-2.14 through M-2.19 (pages 8-17 to 8-18) are worth a read. I have previously written about M-2.17 Parking Management Strategy. This item says that the city will ‘continue’ its parking management strategy. The city has no parking management strategy, at least none ever shared with the public. So ‘continue’ means it is likely that nothing will change. The most important words in the item, however, are ‘could include’. Not will include, not will include on a deadline, but ‘could’. Can you imaging any more wishy-washy wording?

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Parking reform for Sacramento

Dan Allison2 Comments

Note: Added item to Parking fees below, in italic, based on an idea from an article in Streetsblog USA.

Following on to the discussion group topic this week of Walkable City this week, Part 3: Get the Parking Right, here is a list of my thoughts about parking reform in the City of Sacramento. Almost all applies to parking anywhere. I think nearly every one of these has been mentioned in previous posts, but I’ve not brought them together in a single place.

The City of Sacramento has a Parking Services website. Parking Services is part of Public Works.

  • Parking management:
    • Parking must be managed under a city-wide parking management plan, and the plan must be consistent with city and state policy for reducing motor vehicle use and vehicle miles traveled (VMT). The city does not have a parking management plan, so far as is known.
    • Parking mandates must be removed city-wide, not just for the central city and transit oriented locations.
    • The city should foreswear any new structure parking (parking garages or parking decks). Though the city does not have any active plans for new parking, it has had recently, and they may come back.
    • Require all new housing or mixed use developments to unbundle parking, meaning that no free parking is provided for residents, and all parking is available to any person who wants to rent the space. Unbundling should be phased in over five years for all existing parking.
    • Prohibit commercial parking lots adjacent to sidewalks, meaning the buildings must face sidewalks and not parking lots.
    • Property assessment of surface parking lots will be at the same value as the productive land use that existed there before, to discourage building removal and and to keeping of land in less productive or unproductive uses; this requires cooperation from the county
  • Parking fees:
    • A base rate for all parking will be set such that it covers installation, maintenance, and management of all public parking; this rate might vary by whether parking is metered or not, or might be uniform throughout the city.
    • Charge at least the base rate for all street parking, everywhere in the city, via meters or permits, that recovers base rate; NO FREE PARKING!
    • Set variable rates for residential parking permits based on the size, weight, and fuel source of the vehicle
    • Formally implement variable pricing of street and structured parking to achieve Shoup’s 85% utilization
    • Charge for handicapped spaces (this eliminates the motivation for non-handicapped drivers to illegally use handicapped spots)
    • Eliminate all holiday or promotional free parking; research indicates that free parking actually reduces business customers by reducing parking turnover
    • Pilot ideas for charging for delivery use of street parking
  • Parking revenue:
    • Parking revenue will not go into the general fund or to pay off bonds not related to parking, but be used for specific purposes related to parking and neighborhood improvement
    • 50% of parking revenue (above base rate) will be spent on neighborhood improvements on the same streets or within parking districts
    • 50% of revenue (above base rate) will be allocated to transit operations and transit amenities
  • Parking conversion to higher uses:
    • Add trees in the parking lane on all streets without sidewalk buffers; many of the lower income neighborhoods in the city lack sidewalk buffers and private trees, making walking unpleasant and hazardous
    • Do not charge for conversion of street parking to dining space, and minimize permit costs for street dining
    • Provide one or more short-term (20 minutes or less) parking spaces on every block with retail
    • Provide one or more delivery spaces per block with any retail, and enforce against double-parking for delivery where delivery spaces are available
    • Replace parallel parking with diagonal parking on overly wide streets, to slow traffic; most streets in the city are overly wide
    • Where sidewalk or sidewalk buffer space is not available for micro-mobility (bike share, scooter share) parking, street parking will be converted in sufficient quantity
    • Modify development standards to allow only one-side parking in new residential developments
    • Allow conversion of parking to bike facilities where a reduction of travel lanes is not practical (on streets 30 mph or higher)

I strongly believe that the single city action most responsible for the renewal of midtown Sacramento, all the infill development and successful business, is the removal of parking minimums (mandates) from the central city in 2012. Since that time, the city has removed parking mandates from land near major transit stops, and in 2022, the state prohibited cities from establishing mandates near major transit stops (the definition of a major transit stop is fuzzy, however).

The city has proposed, in its draft 2040 General Plan, to remove parking mandates city-wide. It remains to be seen whether pressure from politicians and suburban protectors of ‘their’ street parking spot will subvert this recommendation. 2040 General Plan draft, Chapter 8 Mobility, Goals and Policies M-2.17 Parking Management Strategy, page 8-18.

Other resources:

the blindness of bikes vs parking people

Dan AllisonLeave a comment

I am getting so, so tired of people on Twitter, bicycling advocates, who see bikes and bikes only as the solution to everything.

These are people who believe that it is always best to remove on-street parking in favor of bike lanes, whether regular or separated bikeways. In fact, they are always looking for roads on which to install bike facilities and remove parking, because they get off on the idea of removing all parking. A lot of advocates want bike lanes on every street.

Well, I disagree.

If there is a situation where existing or future bicycling use should be accommodated, and the only way of doing do it is to remove parking, then I’m in agreement. But that is often not the case. On any street with more than two lanes, it is almost always better to remove a travel lane (called general purpose lanes) than to remove parking.

Parking does (at least) two things:

  1. Calms traffic by creating perceived friction, which slows drivers down. It is moving vehicles, quite often moving well over the posted speed limit, that are a hazard to bicyclists, and everyone else. It is not parked cars (not ignoring the issue of door-zone bike lanes).
  2. Provides places for customers to park who so far have not shifted to walking and bicycling, or who are in that rare situation of needing a car for disability reasons or items being picked up/dropped off.

Sure, we need less parking than we have, but no parking is not the solution. If there is no on-street parking, then it increases the demand for surface parking lots, which are the worst possible land use in cities, or for structured parking (parking decks) which are the most expensive type of parking to build, and almost always require taxpayer subsidy. Both of these also produce almost zero property tax and sales tax.

I’m also in favor of managed parking, so that it is never free, and costs enough so that there will always be some empty spaces available, and that drivers are paying market value for parking, and for the cost of the pavement and maintenance they are using. I’m also in favor of designated passenger drop-off/pick-up curbs and unloading/loading curbs for commercial use. We do have too much parking, and way too much free parking. We should have less.

For those who I haven’t convinced, or have made angry (no doubt), please read The High Cost of Free Parking by Donald Shoup, and Walkable City by Jeff Speck. Both recommend retaining parking, but managing it better, in most situations. And removing it when there is really a good justification. Donald Shoup has conducted more research on parking than anyone, and Jeff Speck has designed more projects to improve walkability and livability than most.

Lastly, let me say I hate cars and hate most car drivers. The world would be a better place if we had about 5% of the cars we have now. The world would be a better place if almost all people walked or bicycled for almost all trips, and used transit for the few others. But I think it is dangerous to just remove all parking without looking at the situation on the ground, which includes all modes and everything that is adjacent to the street, including businesses.

Parking thoughts

Dan AllisonLeave a comment

Applicable to the City of Sacramento, but also to any urbanized area:

  • Any block on which parking capacity regularly fills on any day of the week and any time of day should charge parking fees.
  • The price of parking should be managed so as to always have at least one free space per block (the Shoup criteria)
  • Any block with mixed use should have one spot per block for bike racks and scooter parking, and one spot for ride-hailing and delivery use. These spots could be in the space daylighted by red curbs for crosswalk visibility.
  • The fees paid for by residents for parking permits should be sharply increased so that they more closely reflect the cost to the city of providing car storage space for car-owning residents.
  • The income from all new parking fee areas should go into a fund to be spent on the neighborhood that generated it, to enhance livability. It should not go into the general fund, and not be used to bond against. (again, the Shoup criteria)

Free and underpriced parking is one of the largest subsidies the city provides to car owners, but everyone who doesn’t own a car or has on-property parking pays for the subsidy. Which is not fair, and which encourages car ownership and car use.

I’m not suggested we get rid of on-street parking, it is a good use for some of the space we’ve set aside for it, but we do need to manage it more intentionally for the benefit of everyone and all modes of transportation, and charge for what it really costs.

Much more could be said, but that is enough for today.

Hansen’s community meeting on parking

Dan AllisonLeave a comment

timed parking and residential permit
timed parking and residential permit

On August 12, Steve Hansen sponsored a community meeting on parking issues. This is a report and reaction. The meeting was actually quite civil, not often the case when neighborhood people get involved in issues. There was clapping for things they liked but no booing and no angry outbursts.

Matt Eierman, parking manager for the City of Sacramento, presented on the current proposals and a bit about future ideas, what the city is calling “parking modernization.” He addressed concern that there would not be enough parking for the arena by showing a map of downtown parking spaces overlaid with walking distance at the Sleep Train Arena (ARCO), with sufficient parking available.

Eierman claimed that credit card fees at parking meters cannot legally be charged back to the credit card holder, however, San Francisco and many cities outside California are doing just that.

Eierman said dismissively that he hates the idea of “dynamic” parking fees, the idea that parking rates would change with location, time of day or day of week. He said “no wants to drive up to a meter and not know how much it is going to cost.” This is an absurd statement, and I’ll provide an analogy. Would a person say they are never going to buy apples at the store again because they don’t know ahead of time whether they are $0.89 or $1.19 this week? Of course not, people make decisions based on changing information, and parking is no different. With a smart phone, the person would know the fee even before pulling into the space.

The two things being proposed to go the the city council in the near future are:

  1. An increase in the parking rate from $1.25 per hour to $1.75 per hour, at all on-street metered parking in the central city. The city pointed out that fees have not increased in some time, though costs have gone up, and that an increase for on-street parking would shift longer term parking off the streets and to city parking garages and lots, some of which are very underutilized.
  2. A SPOTZone (Special Parking Over Time) pilot in Old Sacramento and one location in midtown that would allow people to pay for time beyond the set time limit, at a higher price. The pricing would discourage long term parking, causing more spaces to be open, but through payment mechanisms (smart meters and smart phone payment) would reduce the number of parking citations.

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