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Parking Minimums Effectively Repealed In Portland – What’s Next?

December 11, 2016 By TonyJ 19 Comments

It took almost four years, but Portland’s growing Shoupista movement succeeded in effectively repealing off-street parking requirements imposed in 2013. This victory demonstrates that parking policy is a viable target for reformers looking to change city policies to encourage more affordable housing, increase use of alternative transportation modes, and take action on climate change.

On November 22nd, the Portland City Council voted to waive minimum parking requirements in new developments near frequent transit if those developments contain affordable housing units. The Comprehensive Plan containing the new rules should go into effect in January 2018, but the parking requirements will most likely fade away much sooner, in February 2017. On December 13, 2016, council is poised to approve an inclusionary housing package that includes the same waiver for parking requirements in exchange for affordable housing. The inclusionary housing rules require affordable homes in any building with 20 or more units. Since parking requirements aren’t triggered until 31 units are built, parking requirements will be waived for (nearly) all new buildings starting in February 2017.

Mayor Charlie Hales casts vote to repeal parking minimums. — For the second time this year, Mayor Hales gives a shoutout to Portlanders for Parking Reform.

The hearing, which you can watch here, was intriguing. The passage of amendment 34 was in serious doubt up to the day of the vote. Commissioner Dan Saltzman had gone on record as opposing removal of the requirements (he wanted to maintain them as a bargaining chit for the inclusionary housing bill) and Commissioner Nick Fish was keeping his cards close to his chest on this one. Commissioner Fish, who has a reputation for being a consensus builder, ended up crafting a compromise amendment which tied the waiver to affordable housing, this brought Saltzman into the fold and ended up winning support for a 4-1 vote in which Commissioner Steve Novick cast a protest vote. Commissioner Amanda Fritz’s support for the amendment (in fact she brought the amendment to the table) was so surprising that it seemed there had to be some catch, a poison pill perhaps, in the amendment. As it turns out, Commissioner Fritz was confused about what she was voting for and has asked council to hold another vote. We expect that Commissioner Novick will switch his vote as well if they re-vote, maintaining a 4-1 majority for this amendment.

Commissioner Amanda Fritz is so committed to car culture that she wants to make sure her record doesn’t reflect a vote against more parking for cars.

We Did It And We’ll Do It Again

Portland Shoupistas has grown, in just one short year, into Portlanders for Parking Reform, a group with credibility and a number of significant wins under our belt. Progressive parking policy is a critical component to providing more affordable housing and encouraging people to drive less, but there have been few, if any, examples of grassroots movements committed to demanding parking reform.

Thank you and congratulations to the hundreds of people who have participated in our actions, amplified our message, and gotten informed about the high costs of our current parking policies. We have a lot more work to do, in Portland and elsewhere, and we plan to keep at it.

What Is Next?

This next week there are two important votes at Portland City Council that are related to parking minimums.

Inclusionary Housing

On Tuesday, December 13th, council will hold a hearing a vote on the Inclusionary Housing package mentioned above. Portland’s Shoupistas are encouraged to support this package as it is the action which will effectively repeal parking minimums. There is a change we would like to see in this package: developers who pay in-lieu fees rather than building affordable units are still required to build parking; these developers should be offered an in-lieu option for parking as well. Those additional fees could go directly to affordable housing funds or towards affordable transit subsidies for low income residents. You can send an email to cctestimony@portlandoregon.gov and to dan@portlandoregon.gov with the subject “Inclusionary Housing.” Include your name and address.

Residential Parking Permits

On Thursday, December 15th, council will hold a hearing and vote on a new overnight Residential Parking Permit program for Portland neighborhoods. This program, which is very close to what we described in our post in January 2016, is a critical step towards managing on-street parking in Portland. The proposal is fairly flexible and we expect that over the next few years a very strong permit program will take shape.

There are two important parts to this proposal that Shoupistas should support. First, update purpose of Portland’s permit program to clarify that it is a “tool to achieve the City’s mode split goals by promoting the use of mass transit, car pooling, bicycling, and walking.” Secondly, the resolution will grant administrative rule-making power, including base permit prices, for the program to the Director of the Portland Bureau of Transportation. This is very important as it will allow the management of the public resource of on-street parking to be implemented with much less political interference.

You can send an email encouraging council to pass this package to cctestimony@portlandoregon.gov with the subject “Residential Permit Program.” Include your name and address.

Ask Your Favorite Local Business To Support Better Parking Policy

November 15, 2016 By TonyJ Leave a Comment

Our efforts to eliminate minimum parking requirements have gotten a boost this last week from the Portland Independent Chamber of Commerce (PICOC) and you can help our campaign by supporting theirs.

PICOC is a coalition of progressive business and community leaders who believe Portland can do better. We’ve heard from advocacy groups about the impact of parking minimums on housing affordability, not to mention sustainability and livability. We’ve also heard loud and clear from businesses that Portland’s current parking management strategy is failing. We think it’s time for Portland to chart a new course.
A business voice in favor of these changes could be pivotal to this vote. Portland’s City Commissioners need to hear from forward-thinking Portland businesses that are ready for comprehensive parking reform. We are calling on local businesses to join with our testimony to City Council. Over 30 businesses have signed on so far. Please ask your favorite local businesses to sign on!

Time is running out so don’t delay! Tweet, email, Facebook, or message this link to those businesses: https://medium.com/@hellopicoc/portlands-parking-policies-are-bad-for-rent-and-bad-for-business-let-s-fix-them-646f6bbb342f#.1yqv4b82k

Portland’s Parking Policy Puts Car Storage Before Housing Affordability

November 15, 2016 By Shoupista 1 Comment

A brand new apartment building with 268 units on N. Williams Ave. opened last month. This apartment is within a 10-minute walk from four TriMet bus routes (#4, #6, #24, & #44), a New Seasons grocery store, and served by the Vancouver-Williams bike lanes and two Biketown stations. The location is excellent for carless Portlanders. Since owning and operating an automobile can cost about $9,000 a year, savings from living without a car means that you have more budget for necessities like housing, health-care, or food. By this logic, the City should encourage more housing development in neighborhoods with abundant transportation options to enhance affordability.

However, housing in transit-rich neighborhoods is becoming increasingly unaffordable. In this new building, a one-bedroom unit costs as much as $1,870 a month. In addition, despite being very accessible by walking, biking, transit, and bike-share, this development includes 237 underground parking stalls (185 residential and 52 commercial), a luxurious amenity that does not benefit people without cars.

I was told by the leasing office that they are running a special offering 9-months of free parking to new tenants. So if you are a car residing in Portland, you will never be homeless because free parking is available almost everywhere. But if you are a renter looking to live in a walkable and transit-accessible neighborhood, you may be out of luck.

Portland’s Perverse Priority: Shelter for Cars, Not Housing for People

In 2013, pressured by residents anxious about growth, City Council adopted a tiered system of minimum parking requirements for new development with more than 30 units. Many housing and transportation advocates believe that this arbitrary mandate have suppressed housing supply and increased the costs of housing.

In September, the White House released a policy document stating that “[p]arking requirements generally impose an undue burden on housing development, particularly for transit-oriented or affordable housing.” As housing gets more and more unaffordable in Portland, our city policy continues to prioritize provision of free park over affordable housing units. Moreover, minimum parking requirements act like a fertility drug for cars. Portland’s 2013 parking mandate has undermined its own climate and transportation goals by inducing more driving, air pollution, and carbon output.

Parking Requirements Raise Income Requirements

Free parking isn’t free. Underground parking costs about $55,000 per space to build according to the Bureau of Planning and Sustainability. In this apartment building’s case, that is $1.3 million added to the development cost, and it is very likely that every unit is now marketed at a higher rate in order to recoup the high costs of free parking. In other words, parking requirements may have ended up raising the income requirements for living in transit-accessible neighborhoods.

To afford paying $1,870 a month on rent, you would need to earn about $68,000 a year. The units in this apartment building may have been more affordable if the development had cost $1.3 million less. Affordable rental units in Portland’s transit accessible neighborhoods are diminishing and parking requirements exacerbates this issue by escalating new housing development costs.

Excessive Parking Supply Won’t Fix Neighborhood On-Street Parking

If a underground parking stall costs $55,000 to build, why would the building management offer 9-months of free parking? Because while the City can require new development to provide on-site parking, it cannot require tenants to park in them. As long as on-street parking remains free, tenants will be incentivized to use curb parking instead of paying to park on-site.

Parking requirements force developers to over-supply parking, which they then give away for free because demand for paid parking is too low to fill the stalls. But the high costs of free parking need to be recovered somehow. As a result, carless tenants end up subsidizing other people’s free parking with their rent.

When buildings offer free parking, they are providing a strong incentive for new tenants to bring their cars with them. In this case, after the 9-month free parking period is over, tenants who brought their cars with them will be inclined to park on the residential streets for free instead of starting to pay for off-street parking. Neighbors who support minimum parking requirements hoping it would prevent parking spillover may soon find their plan backfiring.

As one resident states in her public testimony, Portland’s parking policy is absurd:

“I live in a building with garage parking that is not even full. I do not own a car, but my rent subsidizes the cost of these spots which were “free” at the time I signed my lease because the apartment company was unable to fill them with paying car owners. When I toured apartments on SE Division, THE LEASING AGENTS suggested that if I had a car it was better to park on the street because that was free but the building was charging for garage space. This is all so absurd! Street parking demands should be managed via a residential permitting system. Parking minimums will not help.” – Ellie H

We Can Fix It: Support Housing for People, Not Shelter For Cars

Mayor Hales has proposed to repeal the 2013 parking mandate with Amendment 34 to the Comprehensive Plan. This amendment will effectively eliminate parking minimums for sites near frequent transit service.

This a critical opportunity to set housing for people as priority over shelter for cars, but it won’t happen without your help. City Council needs to hear from you. You can take action in one of the following ways:

Write today to City Council telling them why you support eliminating parking requirements. Write to cputestimony@portlandoregon.gov with subject line “Comprehensive Plan Implementation” Please cc: or bcc: pdxshoupistas@gmail.com. Tell them in your own words that housing is more important than car parking and they should pass Amendments 34 to the Comprehensive plan to eliminate minimum parking requirements in mixed use zones.

If you are available to testify in-person on Thursday, November 17th (or if you can help sign others up at lunch) please RSVP here: https://goo.gl/forms/8ICMdizpy8nIUsZQ2

The Portland Independent Chamber of Commerce (http://picoc.org) is sending an open letter supporting this policy change. If you are a business owner, please sign-on. If you are not a business owner, ask your favorite small businesses (food carts, retailers, etc) to endorse this letter

More information about testifying can be found on this article

Portland’s Parking Problem Is An Excess Of Free On-Street Parking

November 14, 2016 By TonyJ 5 Comments

Everyone needs to wash their clothes. Society provides a number of ways for people to manage this necessity. Some people wash their clothes by hand. Some people pay for a laundry service to wash their clothes. Some people take their clothes to a nearby laundromat. Some people wash their clothes in a communal laundry room. Some people own their own washer and dryer. Some people own very expensive washers and dryers and pay people to wash their clothes in their own home.

Imagine a city where laundry service is free, first come first serve, for as much as the service could handle. Many people get up very early to take their laundry to the service and they don’t own a washer and dryer. Imagine local laundromats are free as well. Most people never consider buying a washer and dryer. Laundromats are very crowded day and night and laundry services reach capacity early in the morning. Should this city require all residents to buy a washer and dryer? Should this city require all new residences, or at least some of them, to have on-site washing machines and dryers? Of course not. The laundry services and laundromats should stop providing free services. People will decide if they are willing to pay for those services. Developers/landlords will provide washers and dryers for residents who prefer the convenience and are willing to shoulder the expense of having that luxury amenity.

Everyone in Portland needs to be able to get around. Some people walk, ride, or take transit, cabs, or Lyfts to their destination. Some people own personal cars. Those people who own cars need places to park them and on-street parking in Portland is like the imaginary laundry service and laundromats, free. In some parts of town, on-street parking is congested day and night. In some neighborhoods residents rush home after work to find a space and the street is packed by 7PM. Should the city solve this problem by requiring some or all new residences to have their own supply of parking? It shouldn’t, but it does.

Contrary to the lead of this KATU news article, Portland doesn’t have a shortage of parking. It’s even disputable that Portland has a shortage of free on-street parking. Instead, Portland has a shortage of political courage to implement effective parking management strategies.

Concerned neighbors would like to continue to require developers to build an “adequate” amount of off-street parking. The problem is that, when on-street parking is literally or practically free, there is no way to tell what an adequate supply of parking is.

There is no magic ratio that will meet parking demand in a dense neighborhood. Excess parking supply will induce demand. As Donald Shoup famously quipped “minimum parking requirements act like a fertility drug for cars.” Opponents to parking reform point out that surveys say 7 of every 10 new residents in mixed use developments own a car when they move in. They say developers should build at least 7 parking spaces for every 10 apartments.

Arbitrary parking ratios make as much sense as arbitrary washer and dryer ratios.

The city doesn’t require in-unit or even on-site washing machines, but somehow, without the benefit of city regulations, people get their clothes washed and here is no such thing as “laundry congestion” and no one speaks of a “laundry nightmare.”

The proper way to determine the right amount of parking for a building is to manage the on-street parking supply with market rate residential permits. If Portlanders truly want to build an equitable, walkable, and sustainable city they should count the on-street parking spaces in their neighborhoods and sell some fraction of that number of parking permits at a price that manages demand.

Portland City Council will hear from citizens on November 17th about an amendment to eliminate minimum parking requirements for new developments near frequent service transit. Join us in encouraging them to pass this amendment.

Email City Council By November 17!

Everyone can do this, do it now!

Write to cputestimony@portlandoregon.gov with subject line “Comprehensive Plan Implementation” Please cc: or bcc: pdxshoupistas@gmail.com.

Tell them in your own words that housing is more important than car parking and they should pass Amendment 34 to the Comprehensive plan to eliminate minimum parking requirements in mixed use zones.

We have talking points if you need them!

Join Us on November 17th and Give Testimony

The biggest impact will come from people showing and speaking to council. Council needs to hear from people who face rent increases and displacement due to anti-affordable housing policy like parking requirements. Testifying is easy. Simply state, in your own words, why this issue concerns you and tell council that you want them to eliminate minimum parking requirements.

We have prepared a document with talking points for your convenience.

November 17th, 2PM @ Portland City Hall

If you plan to testify, please RSVP via this form so we have an idea of what support we can expect. We may be able to save you time by signing you up.

Write to the Commissioners

Send an email to the members of City Council. We suggest you do this by November 17th.

Let City Council Know: Affordable Housing Outranks Parking For Cars

November 10, 2016 By TonyJ 2 Comments

Note: For many of us it is hard to think of much else these days than the recent election results. Many people are afraid, confused, depressed, and discouraged. Local issues like the Residential Infill Project or parking minimums might seem inconsequential to many of us, but they aren’t. City Council is still meeting, they are hearing from residents, deliberating, and making decisions that will affect you, your neighbors, and your family for many years. If you feel hopeless right now about our national situation, we encourage you to work to make positive change where you definitely can, locally.

Next Thursday, November 17th, Portland City Council will hear from citizens about the proposed amendments to the Comprehensive Plan Early Implementation Project. As we found out last week, Mayor Charlie Hales heard from nearly 80 Shoupistas and has proposed to eliminate minimum parking requirements for new developments in Mixed-Use Zones near frequent service transit.

There are many reasons this is a good idea. Parking is expensive and makes housing less affordable. Parking takes up space and leaves less room for housing. Parking brings more cars to our neighborhoods and makes our air dirtier and our streets more dangerous. Parking requirements aren’t even effective at reducing on-street parking congestion; you can force a developer to build a garage, but you can’t force a tenant to rent a stall in it when on-street parking is free!

City council needs to hear from you! Opponents to this amendment are organizing and will be sending in letters of their own. We need to make sure council understands that affordable housing outranks parking for cars.

Email City Council By November 18 @ 5PM!

Everyone can do this, do it now!

Write to cputestimony@portlandoregon.gov with subject line “Comprehensive Plan Implementation” Please cc: or bcc: pdxshoupistas@gmail.com.

Tell them in your own words that housing is more important than car parking and they should pass Amendments 34 to the Comprehensive plan to eliminate minimum parking requirements in mixed use zones.

We have talking points if you need them!

Write to the Commissioners

Send an email to the members of City Council. We suggest you do this by November 18th.

Write to Commissioner Steve Novick, Mayor Charlie Hales, Commissioner Nick Fish, Commissioner Dan Saltzman, and Commissioner Amanda Fritz. Let them know that you value housing for people over shelter for cars. Let’s plan for the future we want for Portland and not a smog-choked-and-gridlocked playground for the wealthy.