Introduction
Whether or not you have been looking for a parking space to park your car, it is an essential problem in the present day. Being worried about finding a parking spot to park your car for a long time will always cause anxiety and stress, especially when you are late for an important event. Lots of people complain about having a shortage of parking spaces. You might have heard this from many of your friends, especially if you live in a big city for many years. People have experienced hours of wandering around to find a parking space for a long period. These days, the problem related to traffic is not only having busy streets in the city, but there is also a lack of parking spaces in different neighborhoods. Looking for parking spaces is more important these days than ever, especially for the United States citizens. Therefore, the lack of parking spots can be considered one of the biggest problems of living in busy neighborhoods. After finding out that a shortage of parking spaces has become a highly considerable problem in big cities that directly affects their infrastructure and people’s emotional wellbeing, it could be said that the potential solutions to this issue are to either enlarge the number of parking spots or to apply modern technologies for their better management. However, after a thorough examination, it was found out that challenges related to finding parking places are not always connected with their shortages – that is why smart parking technologies, improved parking structure, traffic reduction, and the development of public transport will be more efficient. Thus, a sustainable parking action plan should focus on the city’s partial reorganization and adaptation to the increased number of vehicles and their owners’ needs. In general, it will include the current situation’s monitoring and evaluation, the construction of parking spaces in the case of their lack or absence, the improvement of wayfinding, on-street parking management, and ongoing data collection.
Reasons for the Issue
The first reason that shows that a lack of parking spaces is a big issue in a neighborhood is that finding a parking space will waste time, money, and energy of people living in big cities. Compared to the smaller towns and suburbs, people living in big cities should look for parking spots most of their time instead of allocating this time to more important and useful activities. This will cause tiredness and dissatisfaction for most people as they see that they would not have time for the activities they like to do and have to be in a rush often. Statistically speaking, “motorists spend an average of 17 hours a year searching for parking spots on streets, in lots, or garages” (McCoy). As another research result, INRIX Research reveals the cost of parking for drivers and, in general, for the economy by using the world’s largest survey dataset of 6000 drivers in ten cities of the United States. Based on their research, INRIX states that “looking for parking results Americans to pay a cost of $345 per driver in wasted time, fuel and emissions. Moreover, overpaying for parking costs Americans more than $20 billion a year or $97 per driver. The U.S. economy bears the brunt of parking pain as 40% of motorists say they have avoided driving to shops due to parking challenges” (INRIX). They also reported that “because of the lack of parking spaces, 40% of drivers avoid driving to stores” (INRIX). As a real example of the effect of this issue in our lives, my husband and I both live in Santa Monica, which is a busy neighborhood in Los Angeles, and we both drive in our cars. Since we do not have a parking space in our building, we must park our cars on the street. For us, a lack of parking space has been a big problem for years. Besides, it wastes countless amounts of our time daily on the streets and alleys around where we live to find the right place to park. If we want to park our cars on the corner of our street due to the lack of parking, we have a long way to go back to our house. I remember that once, my husband, Mr. Moghani, told me that “walking in a street that is full of homeless people specifically at night is dangerous and is not secure for me at all” (Mr. Moghani). Therefore, a lack of parking spots can waste people’s time, money, and resources and causes them to suffer from living in busy neighborhoods.
The second issue with a lack of parking is that parking problems can affect the design of the neighborhoods and cities. As the demand for the number of cars that people buy increases, the demand for parking spots increases as well. As a result, there is more need for parking spots next to the buildings. This increment in the number of street parking spots will increase the distances between the buildings in a neighborhood. This will make walking more difficult compared to the case that the buildings are closer to each other. Also, “the aesthetically-continuous pleasing street facades become almost impossible due to the several gaps in these facades between buildings created by parking areas” (Manville). Moreover, parking in front of the streets and close to the buildings will block the pedestrian ways in sidewalks, and it will not allow them to enter a building easily. Another issue with the lack of parking that affects the urban design is that people have to park their cars in public areas, such as squares and public shopping centers. Therefore, these public areas will lose their facades because of lots of car parking in these areas. Moreover, some of these public areas have been destroyed as they have lost their initial definition, and parking spots over time have replaced them. According to Todd, “parking lots are generally considered the least glamorous and most environmentally harmful type of land use” (Litman). Therefore, lack of parking will have negative effects on urban architecture.
Causes of a Lack of Parking Places
After understanding the lack of parking space as one of the most important issues in almost all neighborhoods in big cities, a question that arises here is the main causes of the lack of parking in big cities? Although different groups of people consider different causes for the lack of parking spots to answer this question, I believe that lack of parking is mainly because of three reasons: increment in population and number of cars in an area, the street sweeping, and the old city architecture.
The first and the most important cause with the big cities’ neighborhoods is that there is not enough parking space to park due to the increase in the number of cars and people in this area. To go further into the issue, parking spaces are lesser than the number of cars that exist in this area. Most of the neighbors who live in big city neighborhoods have more than one car. By increasing the demand for more cars per family in big cities, finding parking spaces has become one of the world’s most important problems as this increase in the number of cars will result in a shortage of parking spots. Xu et al. claim that “studies conducted in 11 major cities found that on average, 30% of the cars in congested downtown traffic were cruising for parking and the average cruising time is 8.1 min per car” (Xu et al.). As an example of a busy city, according to the Localize City analysis, “residents of Santa Monica, LA, area are more frustrated about finding parking spots compared to other locations at the Los Angeles. The area saw roughly 137,000 blocked driveway and parking complaints over the past five years – an increase of 162 percent” (Charky). As another example, one of the local corporators, Samir Pradhan says that “although there are about 1,000 quarters, housing around 5,000 state government employees and their families, absence of garage facilities has been posing serious problems for residents. The inhabitants here virtually fight among themselves when it comes to parking vehicles. Many times, the fights have reached police station” (Ramanath). Hence, the increment in population and the number of cars this population needs is almost the most important cause of the parking problem, especially in big cities.
The second reason that causes a shortage of parking in big cities’ neighborhood is street sweeping. Street sweeping usually happens in the early morning, and if residents who do not have parking forget and park their cars in the sweeping street areas, they will usually receive a ticket. Based on the Santa Monica area rule, “all the cars that parked on the street must be parked on one side of the street due to street sweeping that occurs every Thursday and Friday mornings” (City of Santa Monica). If you do not park your car on the side of the street that is planned to be cleaned, you will receive a ticket for $70 after 10 am, which has caused many neighbors to park their cars in the middle of the sidewalk, in other people’s private parking spots, or in front of the mailboxes. This issue will cause anger and dissatisfaction for people who have cars and people who want to park in their private parking that is occupied by others’ cars and people who want to check their mailbox. Moreover, residents of this area do not want to pay the city’s tickets, especially during the pandemic. For example, in Orange County, CA, “even though fewer of the $30 tickets are being issued, city sanitation officials say they receive as many as 10 complaints about restricted parking each week” (Grad). As another example, Mr. Morgan, who lives in our neighborhood in Santa Monica, once said to me that his daughter, who parked her car on the street at night, fell asleep in the morning and was not able to pick her car up from the side of the street at 10 am. Therefore, she received a ticket for $70. He also said that “paying for these tickets is difficult for my family” (Mr. Morgan) When the pandemic started, the city of Santa Monica made street parking available for the residents even during the street sweeping. Therefore, most of the parking restrictions have been removed or relaxed during the COVID-19 pandemic, even if there were street sweeping. However, the street sweeping fines are back recently. A tragedy for the neighbors and what they mostly complained about was that the complete information on the changes in the rules for the neighbors affected by street sweeping after the pandemic, including the calendar date and the amount of fine, has not been explained with details in the website that the city provided. Therefore, when these restrictions were back after the pandemic, most of the residents of this neighborhood became surprised after receiving their fines and tickets. As a result, they did not accept and became convinced easily that they received a ticket, and they should pay for it. Moreover, they were saying that since the pandemic has not been finished, the city’s decision has not been not fair, and it has not become public regarding starting street cleaning again. As another instance, our friend Greg received a parking ticket in the Santa Monica neighborhood because of the street sweeping, and he was complaining about it. He said, “I received a $73 parking ticket on Santa Monica Blvd because of the street sweeping during Thursday morning, although I, as a resident of this area, have not been informed correctly that the street sweeping is back” (Greg). He mentioned that he went to the city’s parking department to contest his citation and wasted his time by about three hours. Hence, the Thursday and Friday morning’s street sweeping can cause a shortage of parking spots on the street and anger for the neighbors in the big cities’ neighborhoods.
The third cause for the lack of parking in big cities is the architecture in old cities. In the past, when there were not lots of population and cars in old cities, and most of the people were commuting by horses and carts, streets had been architecturally designed as small passages and alleys. Since the architecture of these old cities’ allies cannot be altered because of their historical value, some areas in these small allies must be used for parking, especially if they are closed to a shopping center or a public place. However, these small streets do not have a parking capacity for the present day’s existing cars. As an example of an old country with big cities, we can consider India. The North Corporation, in its report, indicated “the magnitude of parking problems in the capital-cars use about 10% of the total urbanized area and walkways are encroached upon due to unregulated parking in new Delhi” (Bennett 1). Also, some residents complained about the parking issue, as, for example, nobody is regulating parking around Chowmohalla Palace, and traffic police must intervene and regulate parking. In turn, police said that “there are narrow lanes and routes at many places in Old City, where road widening is essential,” said Ravi Shankar, Traffic ACP, Charminar (Bennett 2). Therefore, the old architecture of the cities can be considered as another cause of traffic.
To conclude, lack of parking space for cars is a permanent problem of most of the busy neighborhoods, especially in big and old cities. The lack of parking can result in a waste of time, money, and resources for the residents, as well as distorting the urban design. To recapitulate the reasons, not only the increase in the number of cars and people can cause a shortage of parking spots in big cities, but also street sweeping on Thursday and Friday mornings and the architecture of old cities can become an important reason for the shortage of parking spots at this place. Hence, I think the reasons and causes that I have provided above in favor of the lack of parking spots and garages as one of these days’ important issue is very reasonable for big and crowded cities.
Potential Solutions
Car parking in urban areas has already become a major problem in both developing and developed countries. High parking tariffs, traffic congestion, and a lack of parking space are examples of parking problems, which citizens face on a daily basis, searching for parking places for long periods of time (Ibrahim 1). At first sight, the solution seems obvious – as car ownership has rapidly increased and there is an imbalance between parking demand and supply, the number of parking slots should be increased. As a result, the majority of people will have an opportunity to leave their vehicles near home. In general, car parking may currently be provided in three major forms – on-street parking (curb parking), off-street parking (parking lot), and parking structures (Ibrahim 4). In turn, structures are divided into two types – an individual structure or a multi-story garage and a single or double floor that constitute either the podium if above ground or the building basement if underground (Ibrahim 4). Thus, conventional parking planning primarily focuses on quantity and the tendency to provide as many parking spots as possible to fulfill car owners’ needs.
However, this seemingly simple decision turns out to be completely inefficient as, according to multiple studies, a lack of parking spaces is not directly connected with their physical presence. Surprisingly, it is even too much space designed for parking. Some analysts suggest that the United States contains 2 billion parking spots, and every standard parking place, “which measures a little more than six by three metres, takes up about as much space as a small Parisian studio apartment, a low-income-housing unit in India or three office cubicles” (Sisson). In addition, according to modern standards of civil construction planning, parking slots should be included in a design. As a result, parking spaces line urban neighborhoods’ streets in many areas, occupy asphalt around shopping centers and offices, and stack floors in parking garages. In addition, the parking lot at the West Edmonton Mall in Alberta, Canada, which is the largest one in the world, boasts 20,000 parking spaces and covers the space for a neighborhood that could contain approximately 500 houses (Sisson). Even more troubling is the fact that all these parking spaces are not actually used much. According to the study organized by the Center for Neighborhood Technology, a non-profit organization in Chicago that investigates sustainable development, “a quarter to a third of parking spaces around apartment buildings in many US cities sat empty” (Sisson). That is why, taking into consideration that the average automobile stays at rest considerably much more time than moves, the creation of more parking spaces that will use the land but remain empty cannot be regarded as the most efficient solution.
As previously mentioned, in a substantial number of big cities, there are parking places for citizens, however, they are used irrationally. That is why an efficient solution to parking problems may include smart parking technologies, improved parking structure, traffic reduction, and the development of public transport. Smart parking systems are a modern solution that has become available due to technological progress. Although these systems may vary insignificantly from one place to another, they aim to “monitor parking space availability in a facility and relay this information to people through easy-to-understand user interfaces in applications that are accessed through a smartphone or computer” (Harding Steel). With the help of sensors installed in parking spots, smart parking systems may detect whether a vehicle is parked at this place or no. There are multiple detection methods for sensors’ functioning, including electromagnetic fields, infrared, or ultrasonic waves (Harding Steel). Later, a cloud network receives data from the sensors and communicates it to user devices in real-time through internet-connected applications. Another method for the reduction of parking places’ shortage related to the improvement of general structure is shared parking facilities and mixed-used parking. They imply the collective use of parking areas by different facilities at different times. For instance, parking slots may be used by offices and business centers in the morning and by restaurants and nightclubs in the evening. This technique may provide the use of space to the fullest extent without unnecessary expansion. Finally, state and local authorities may contribute to the solution of the parking issue by the development of public transport as an alternative to individual vehicles. In addition, parking should become generally affordable in relation to prices to avoid the shortage of places in affordable parking and the absence of cars in expensive ones. In general, these solutions are the most effective as they may reduce the lack of parking places without considerable changes in cities’ infrastructures and reconstruction.
Action Plan
In fact, successful implementation of a sustainable parking action plan is ultimately dependent on the ability of a particular city to adapt to specific changes as they are inevitable. It goes without saying that all steps should be taken along with community feedback, data collection, and ongoing evaluation of results to determine further steps (Dixon Resources Unlimited and Wood Solutions Group 5). In general, an efficient action plan dedicated to the elimination of the problem related to a lack of parking spaces should be balanced, adaptable, accessible, sustainable, and data-driven. In other words, this plan should have the potential to be changed, improved, and adapted to a city’s needs over the course of time. In addition, it should promote accessibility and safety and consider the interests of all population groups, including residents, visitors, business owners, customers, and employees. Thus, the implementation of a parking action plan should start with the evaluation of the current situation. For this, a specific parking map of a city should be created every five years in order to evaluate the availability of parking spaces across different territories. As previously mentioned, the problem of parking is not always connected with a lack of spaces; however, in certain areas, this lack may be actually observed. In this case, parking spaces should be created in accordance with a city’s architecture and infrastructure.
The next step implies the optimization of existing parking spaces’ use through the rise of public awareness. Moreover, wayfinding and navigating may be highly challenging, especially for a city’s visitors and newcomers due to a lack of infirmity. As a result, the creation of a wayfinding signage plan and the maintenance of parking signage around a city to mark available parking spaces may be regarded as efficient. In addition, the use of previously mentioned smart parking systems will help citizens monitor parking space availability through accessible and easy-to-understand user interfaces in applications on smartphones or computers (Harding Steel). Subsequently, the system of on-street parking should be organized as an excellent option for those citizens who want to leave their vehicle for less than 3 hours (Dixon Resources Unlimited and Wood Solutions Group 6). Short-term parking will occur in the most convenient spaces, for instance, to provide people’s access to downtown businesses. In turn, long-term parking should be concentrated in off-street locations. Finally, an efficient action plan requires constant monitoring of results and data collection in order to optimize strategic investments in technologies and parking optimization.
Conclusion
With an increasing number of vehicles, a lack of parking spaces has already become a highly disturbing issue in big cities. Finding a parking space wastes time, money, and energy of people on a daily basis. There are three fundamental reasons for this issue – increment in population and number of cars in an area, the street sweeping, and the old city architecture. Although the creation of more parking spaces looks like the most appropriate solution, multiple studies indicate that there are many parking spaces that are not used or used irrationally in the majority of areas. Thus, the most efficient solutions may include the use of smart parking technologies, traffic reduction, improved parking structure, and the development of public transport. In addition, authorities should elaborate on and implement an efficient, safe, sustainable, balanced, accessible, and data-driven parking action plan to monitor the current situation, construct parking places if necessary, improve wayfinding, organize on-street parking, and collect data to optimize investments.
Works Cited
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