The High Cost of Free Parking, Updated Edition

Building parking costs our municipalities, businesses we shop at, schools we attend (or pay tuition at for our kids!) a lot of money! Perhaps $5K for a standard, uncovered surface asphalt space at your "local" strip mall, supermarket etc. adds up very quickly when the municipalities FORCE private owners to build huge parking lots. Drivers like the "free" parking, but who really pays? We all do. If you bike to the Cooperative market, you're paying for parking in higher grocery prices, if you walk to the farmer's market, you're paying higher prices for your fresh veggies due to expensive parking. This isn't just about "parking" it's about LAND USE, about ENVIRONMENTAL CONSCIOUSNESS, about EQUITY---what does your city spend money on and who does it help? what policies are in place that make driving places easy, is not supportive of public transit nor makes conditions safe and pleasurable for walking and biking? I challenge you to read through the first chapter and not want to talk to your public officials and tell them about this.What development projects are getting denied or can't be built because of "minimum parking requirements" (forcing owners to build extra large parking lots they don't need)?

Sadly I ended up knocking off a star for my review of this book for a couple reasons. First the author relies on a lot of suppositions for several chapters because his proposals had yet to be implemented. While understandable it does mean there's a lot of guesswork involved. Like a lot of my experience with economics the formulas are very pretty but rely upon a staggering number of assumptions. I would have liked to see more hard data.My other issue is despite this being an updated edition, most of it dates from 2004 with significant amounts of the data being even older. In the past twenty years we have seen some changes but also a lot of business as usual. I would have liked to know if Shoup's proposals had been accepted or implemented anywhere and what the results have been. Smartphones didn't even exist in 2004 and now we can pay for parking (or get a ride through a car sharing service) with our phones. Clearly there have been significant changes but our problems with parking probably have not changed much as well. I just wish there was more modern data included.Overall I think the book is good but there are definitely parts you can skip.

This book should be required reading for anybody who drives, or walks where cars are driven. This book does a brilliant job of pointing out the many distortions and problems caused by the almost universal expectation that parking should be free. Parking, in cities, is an incredibly valuable resource but because it is often free or underpriced it is used inefficiently. This ultimately benefits no one. The crazy (illogical, unjustified, counter productive) parking requirements in most cities zoning laws force developers to build massive amounts of parking to justify the powerful demand for free parking. If chocolate/liquor/cocaine were free then they would be overused and there would be shortages, so we shouldn't be surprised that the same thing happens with parking.My only complaint about this book is that it is too big. I wish that it was half the size with better summaries and less redundancy. But, well worth getting, reading, and sharing.

Lot to absorb - for a data geek like me (getting PhD in data science, dissertation on London congestion pricing) this book was uber-helpful and a good read. I am def. a Shoupista now.

As extensive as it is, "The High Cost of Parking" is merely a regurgitation of well-worn ideas that generally originate from consultants working for large scale developers that want to eliminate having to provide on-site parking in buildings that they build in order reduce the costs of construction. Having to provide on-site parking in a building is generally one-third the cost of a project although it is much cheaper where the parking is on surface parking lots. Where it gets costly is when the developer must excavate the site to construct the parking which is usually the case in large cities. So it is easy why developers are pushing to eliminate "free parking" and they have found a stooge in Professor Donald Shoup.Now no one would be expected to call the former head of the UCLA Department of Urban Planning and Professor Emeritus a stooge, particularly a graduate of UCLA who took courses in that department as I have, but unfortunately that is what he is. I expected a scholarly work but I was sadly disappointed. Instead the book is a blatant effort to promote the end to all free parking and Shoup breaks all scholarly rules in his zeal to send his message. He is so engrossed in sending his message that he can't see the forest for the trees. His objectivity is clouded with his subjectivity.As Shoup says, parking is not taught in urban planning courses and many of us had to learn what it is all about in the real world. Unfortunately, Prof. Shoup has never been out of his ivory tower so he doesn't have that experience.Ir is not that some of the schemes he advocates will work in certain localities which have all the elements necessary to work but Shoup makes the mistake of trying to jam square pegs through round holes in advocating that his schemes will work everywhere.For example, what works in San Francisco ain't going to work in Los Angeles as he advocates. San Francisco, the most densely populated city in California with an area of 44 square miles and which has a highly centralized commercial area with a well developed public transit system does not compare with Los Angeles which sprawls over 469 square miles and with a almost non-existent public transportation system and a mountain range splitting the city. Shoup is comparing apples to oranges and he does this with many other communities. It works in San Francisco so it should work every where else.Moreover, his analysis of parking problems is usually incomplete and it can't be determined as whether the inadequacies of his analysis are due to ignorance or whether the omissions are purposeful because they defeat his goal of convincing everyone to abandon free parking.One example is the chapter on "The Pseudoscience of Planning for Parking" where he argues that the parking requirements imposed by cities are arbitrary and excessive. He cites studies that show that often much of the parking goes unused in office buildings even when 97% of the employees drive to work. But what Shoup omits is the reasons why the spaces are not used.That is because in those buildings, clients, customers, and top management are provided with free parking and not the employees. So where do the employees park? Usually in the nearby residential neighborhoods thus defeating the very purpose that cities set requirements for on-site parking. What is the solution? Pass an ordinance that requires all landlords to provide free parking for all employees, clients, and customers. However, it is not in Shoup's interest to promote such a solution.Instead, to prevent employees from parking in nearby neighborhoods, he proposes that all parking on streets, including residential streets be rented to parkers, including the homeowners. For someone who has a PhD in economics, it is another instance where Shoup's economics are suspect. Why? Because when a housing tract is built, the costs of constructing the streets, sidewalks, and curbs are included in the price that the homeowner pays to buy the house and in most cases, the homeowner also owns the property to the middle of the street but gives the city a street easement. Moreover, the homeowner pays for the maintenance of the street, sidewalk, and curb through property and gas taxes. But Shoup now wants the homeowner to rent the parking spaces which the homeowner has already paid for (doing this will depress property values contrary to Shoup's assertion). While having to rent street parking spaces may solve keeping employees and customers from parking in residential neighborhoods, such an idea will never fly politically so why waste paper talking about it.And the parking requirements which Shoup criticizes as arbitrary are not arbitrary at all. Contrary to what he thinks, I have read volumes of studies supported by extensive research that justify those requirements. On the surface, they may appear arbitrary but the requirements are well documented and there are good reasons supporting them.Shoup delves heavily on what it costs to construct a parking space in a parking structure and contends that it is not cost effective. But he repeats his sins by not providing a cost-benefit analysis. And there are considerable benefits, particularly in major shopping areas such as Santa Monica and Beverly Hills. Parking structures which provide free parking to shoppers result in substantial increases in sales tax revenues which help pay for other city services which enhance the quality of life for the residents. Another advantage of free parking in any commercial area abutting residential neighborhoods is that customers and employees park there instead in the neighborhoods. Such free parking also substantially reduces "cruising", a Shoup anathema.He is critical of restrictions of converting older apartment buildings into condominiums unless current parking requirements are satisfied arguing that this prevents people from owning their own homes. But Shoup fails to set forth the reason why cities have this policy which is to preserve low income rental housing, a socially desirable goal.The book is replete with non-sequiturs, far too many to discuss here. But I asked my wife, a retired school teacher, to read the book. Her reaction was that it was written by a crackpot. Unfortunately, unlike her, there are many who should know better that have been suckered in by his siren song. I hope after reading this, others will not be so gullible.

Wer in einem nicht verkehrsplanerisch angehauchten Freundes- oder Kollegenkreis erzählt, dass man 808 Seiten über Parkraumbewirtschaftung gelesen hat, wird sicherlich merkwürdige Blicke ernten. Der Autor schafft es aber auf eine gut verständliche Art, die Probleme von "kostenlosem" Parken, die gesellschaftlichen Kosten dieses Phänomens und gute Gründe dafür vorzustellen, warum Parken nie kostenlos ist und für den Endnutzer nicht sein darf. Auch zeigt er verschiedene gute Gründe dafür auf, warum Parken möglichst immer mit direkten Zahlungen für den Endnutzer verbunden sein sollte. Eine Pflichtlektüre für jeden, der sich im ehrenamtlichen oder beruflichen Umfeld für eine nachhaltigere Park- und Verkehrskultur einsetzen möchte. Ich greife immer wieder zu diesem Buch, wenn ich ein paar plakative Beispiele für den Parkplatzwahnsinn in unseren Städten brauche. Allerdings hat das Buch einen starken Fokus auf den US Amerikanischen Raum. Wer damit leben kann sollte zugreifen.

Every planner should read it, no matter if you work directly with parking or not.

Ho deciso di acquistare questo libro a scopo di ricerca personale e mi è risultato molto utile! scritto in modo chiaro e assolutamente comprensibile!

Product as promised.