Downtown Housing... Without Parking

Would this fly in Pittsburgh? Or only in places where housing is prohibitively expensive?

Although condominiums without parking are common in Manhattan and the downtowns of a few other East Coast cities, they are the exception to the rule in most of the country. In fact, almost all local governments require developers to provide a minimum number of parking spaces for each unit — and to fold the cost of the space into the housing price.

The exact regulations, which are intended to prevent clogged streets and provide sufficient parking, vary by city. Houston’s code requires a minimum of 1.33 parking spaces for a one-bedroom and 2 spaces for a three-bedroom. Downtown Los Angeles mandates 2.25 parking spaces per unit, regardless of size.

Today, city planners around the country are trying to change or eliminate these standards, opting to promote mass transit and find a way to lower housing costs.

Seems to me that if I want to build condos for people who don't want or don't need a car, I ought to be allowed to give it a shot.

The more you look at this, the more you see the really weird complexities involved.

In San Francisco, more downtown housing has been approved over the last few years than in the last 20 years combined, said Joshua Switzky, a city planner. The booming real estate market there inspired local officials to revoke minimum-parking requirements in the central core, Mr. Switzky said. “The city’s modus operandi is ‘transit first,’ ” he said. “Everyone recognized the existing rules didn’t match the policy.”

Under San Francisco’s new parking maximums, downtown developers are also required to “unbundle” the price of parking from the price of the condo. “Buyers aren’t obligated to buy a parking space, and developers don’t have the incentive to build spaces they can’t sell,” Mr. Switzky said.

Bundling? Parking minimums? Parking maximums? What a colossal hassle. No wonder people moved out of cities.

But like I said, I am not sure how this would fly here in Pittsburgh. In San Francisco, one of the driving factors is cost. A single parking spot there costs $40,000, and people who are already maxed out on immensely expensive condos are willing to sacrifice their car. Would they be so willing if that parking spot only added a few thousand dollars to the total cost. I don't know. Anyone have any idea what a parking spot costs here?

Either way, I think developers ought to be allowed to roll the dice if they think there is a market for condos without parking spots.

Comments

Sam,

Does it give a specific person to send bribes to or do they use a drop box?? Seems like a large part of downtown housing prices might be the cost of finding the drop boxes.

[john morris]

Sean,

Seems like Macy's can do the math and has an idea of where people who live in sprawl shop.
they shop in malls. Of course depending on the subsidy deal they can redo the math-- untill the subsidy runs out.

[sean mcdaniel]

so JM, why can't the almighty and righteous city population sustain a viable downtown? or in other words, why don't city residents shop downtown? could it be for many many years, suburbanites propped up the downtown shopping district...until the stores moved to the malls?

you know, when I grew up in Sewickley, we shopped downtown...went to doctors downtown...saw movies downtown...ate in restaurants downtown (where my mother worked as a waitress). of course, my parents started going to North Hills when Horne's, Gimbel's and Kaufmann's opened there. The same pattern happened in Monroeville and South Hills too...and all over the country. Seems like retailers (and shoppers) were more than willing to give up on downtown.

and consider this, the Pittsburgh metro population over the past 50 years is basically the same, around 2.3 million. which means that more people have always lived in the suburbs than in the city. which means a half century ago those suburbanites supported dowtown as much or more than city residents, because there were no malls, no first run theaters, not all that many decent restaurants (at least in the north hills) or medical complexes in suburbia. everything was downtown...and everyone had to go there to get everything from school clothes to cavities filled. so do you understand my line of thinking that suburbanites did more than their share to support the city? does that make sense to you?

if you had been around spouting your us vs. them BS back then, would you have argued that suburbanites were draining the city of revenues? or that they were helping to make pittsburgh a vital place?