Idea for fixing the housing shortage

Seems like the perfect scenario for an innovative developer to make a ton of money by supplying much needed parking. At their discretion.
 
Tallguy said:
Too bad developers would build without sufficient parking and expect the surrounding streets to absorb the cars
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The supply of parking really should be a function of how important it is to people there. I don't think we should be in the business of giving everyone free street parking, space is valuable. Free parking encourages more car ownership than is efficient and that has externalities in the form of pollution and traffic.

If a developer is able to sell out their apartment complex with no resident parking, then they've made a great choice of location and we can increase mbta utilization. If they put it somewhere people don't want to live without paying, they're screwed and they'll need to lower the price until they can find residents willing to make the tradeoff.
 
sean99090900 said:
Free parking encourages more car ownership than is efficient and that has externalities in the form of pollution and traffic.
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Such is Da Burbz.

See I think developers don't care. If they can get the Bag Men to fund a Burb project with insufficient parking, and it fails... well that's the Bag Men's problem and not the developers.

sean99090900 said:
If a developer is able to sell out their apartment complex with no resident parking, then they've made a great choice of location and we can increase mbta utilization. If they put it somewhere people don't want to live without paying, they're screwed and they'll need to lower the price until they can find residents willing to make the tradeoff.
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... and the Towns if the inevitable "Solution" is to bring in Section 8 tenants.
 
Tallguy said:
Too bad developers would build without sufficient parking and expect the surrounding streets to absorb the cars
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Some newer developments in Boston ban residents at that address from getting on-street parking permits to try and avoid this issue.
 
jklo said:
See I think developers don't care. If they can get the Bag Men to fund a Burb project with insufficient parking, and it fails... well that's the Bag Men's problem and not the developers.
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If this is true, then those incentives are misaligned. Broadly speaking, the developer should be incentivized to make decisions that make their development economically attractive. If the town is on the hook for the developer's bad decisions (for example, actually not providing enough parking), then yeah, we're going to end up with all sorts of perverse, defensive regulations like parking minimums.
 
Like many conversations surrounding individual policies, the impact is I think quite overstated by both sides. We aren’t debating a theoretical and looking at a few case studies would be helpful.

Hartford, Connecticut got rid of parking minimums in 2017. It has neither created a parking apocalypse nor been a panacea for the city. Median rent is still increasing year over year, though probably not as much as it would be without it, since much of the new supply that’s come or is coming online is downtown. I’ll try and do a deeper dive when I have more time.

 
jklo said:
Such is Da Burbz.

See I think developers don't care. If they can get the Bag Men to fund a Burb project with insufficient parking, and it fails... well that's the Bag Men's problem and not the developers.



... and the Towns if the inevitable "Solution" is to bring in Section 8 tenants.
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Out that far from city center you have two forces that work on providing more parking per unit:
1) parking/driving is worth more to tenants in a car centric area
2) land is cheaper per unit area

I'm at least unsure whether it's true that a developer isn't on the hook for an unsuccessful project. They have a financial stake in how well their project performs and will need to pay back the money raised regardless of the revenue on their new investment. But even if it were the responsibility of the bankers(?) then they'd have the same incentive structure to fund projects that have a decent likelihood of success.

I do think you rightly point out that a lot of this probably has more to do with a desire to keep out the carless from a neighborhood than anything else though.
 
sean99090900 said:
The supply of parking really should be a function of how important it is to people there. I don't think we should be in the business of giving everyone free street parking, space is valuable. Free parking encourages more car ownership than is efficient and that has externalities in the form of pollution and traffic.

If a developer is able to sell out their apartment complex with no resident parking, then they've made a great choice of location and we can increase mbta utilization. If they put it somewhere people don't want to live without paying, they're screwed and they'll need to lower the price until they can find residents willing to make the tradeoff.
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That's fine inside 128, but good luck selling the idea of limiting street parking in the suburban mini cities.
 
BPDA didn't seem to have a problem approving that as part of Common Allbright:


We also support the Proponents’ approach to transportation demand management and alternative forms oftransportation. Specifically, we appreciate that the Proponents aim to incentivize car-free or car-lite lifestyles for residents of the Project by pledging to take the following steps:
Unbundling parking costs from rent costs and charging market rate for off-street parking.
Mandating that any residents who live in the building and own a car must purchase onsite parking. Residents are prohibited from obtaining a City of Boston Resident Parking sticker (lease provision).
 
KCasiglio said:
Like many conversations surrounding individual policies, the impact is I think quite overstated by both sides. We aren’t debating a theoretical and looking at a few case studies would be helpful.

Hartford, Connecticut got rid of parking minimums in 2017. It has neither created a parking apocalypse nor been a panacea for the city. Median rent is still increasing year over year, though probably not as much as it would be without it, since much of the new supply that’s come or is coming online is downtown. I’ll try and do a deeper dive when I have more time.

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So I chose Hartford for two reasons. 1) It's a nearby city that should be at least known of to everyone in this board, as a New England state capitol, and 2) We have the best ability to see the impacts because it was the first 'major' (over 100k population) city to eliminate parking minimums in the US, going on about 6 1/2 years ago. Given the slow pace at which development moves (itself a data point in how parking minimums are neither cure-all nor harbinger of doom) it's the best American case study to look at in general.

Per the Parking Reform Network 22% of downtown Hartford was still off-street surface parking (as in, not including street parking, underground parking, and podium parking. Only including what was visible from satellite view) as of June 2023, 5 1/2 years after parking minimums were abolished. Still 2% above what they found the average to be for American city downtowns (20%).

Hartford.png


That said, the elimination of parking minimums has had impact, particularly in affordable housing. Housing that would not have been built with the old parking requirements was instead built. Downtown Hartford also had large increases in population between 2010-2020, even while the city on the whole declined in population. It also had the largest increase in housing units over this time period of any Hartford neighborhood (I would suspect because the sheer amount of vacant lots meant there was low hanging fruit).

I'm not finding 5 year rent trends very easily, but per apartments.com, year over year average rent is up 3.1% for Hartford. That is a higher rate of increase than any of CT's other 100k+ cities, New Haven, Bridgeport, Stamford, and Waterbury. Though, it is less than nearby Springfield.

All this to reinforce what I said before. Parking minimums are not the be all end all on their own. Nor is eliminating single family zoning. Nor is eliminating height restricts, design review boards, or any individual policy. We, across the country, have over time developed a robust portfolio of roadblocks to housing.

Removing parking minimums is just the start.
 
KCasiglio said:
Hartford, Connecticut got rid of parking minimums in 2017. It has neither created a parking apocalypse nor been a panacea for the city. Median rent is still increasing year over year, though probably not as much as it would be without it, since much of the new supply that’s come or is coming online is downtown.
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You are implying that a significant increase in housing stock would lead to a decrease in rent, yeah? I feel like that's a safe assumption for a place like Boston, which is already a highly desirable and expensive place to live. Hartford, though, isn't so high-demand. Its median rent is below the national average for cities. Couldn't replacing parking lots with housing in a place like Hartford actually increase rents by making its streetscape more desirable?
 
kdmc said:
You are implying that a significant increase in housing stock would lead to a decrease in rent, yeah? I feel like that's a safe assumption for a place like Boston, which is already a highly desirable and expensive place to live. Hartford, though, isn't so high-demand. Its median rent is below the national average for cities. Couldn't replacing parking lots with housing in a place like Hartford actually increase rents by making its streetscape more desirable?
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I would push back on both how significant Hartford’s housing stock increase has been and also caution that no one municipality exists in a vacuum. Housing stock increase has been consistent with increased demand, at least downtown, and West Hartford in particular exerts some gravity on western Hartford (for lack of better phrasing).
 
KCasiglio said:
no one municipality exists in a vacuum
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Agreed. My point is that housing production is a Good Thing even when it doesn't lower rents for the exact place that the housing is built. Thus, neighborhood rent is a bad metric for evaluating the success of YIMBY policies on affordability. IMO, the only metric that matters for evaluating Hartford's parking minimum policy is how much housing was built.

Put another way: any housing production in New England will increase the housing supply in New England (duh), which means that it should help lower New England's average rent. However, if that infill makes a particular neighborhood (e.g. Hartford) more attractive, then it could lead to a localized demand increase for that neighborhood.

That's not an argument against good infill, although it definitely gets used as one by working class NIMBYs:
  • "the luxury apartments are going to gentrify the neighborhood!"
  • "building over the parking lots just brought in more yuppies and didn't lower our rent!"
Instead, this should be an argument for ensuring that everyone is building good infill so that the region-wide housing supply increase is able to compensate for the increased local demand. Infill Hartford and Bridgeport, but also make Glastonbury and Waterford denser. Build everywhere, not just where working- and lower-class folks live.
 
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KCasiglio said:
So I chose Hartford for two reasons. 1) It's a nearby city that should be at least known of to everyone in this board, as a New England state capitol, and 2) We have the best ability to see the impacts because it was the first 'major' (over 100k population) city to eliminate parking minimums in the US, going on about 6 1/2 years ago. Given the slow pace at which development moves (itself a data point in how parking minimums are neither cure-all nor harbinger of doom) it's the best American case study to look at in general.

Per the Parking Reform Network 22% of downtown Hartford was still off-street surface parking (as in, not including street parking, underground parking, and podium parking. Only including what was visible from satellite view) as of June 2023, 5 1/2 years after parking minimums were abolished. Still 2% above what they found the average to be for American city downtowns (20%).

View attachment 51423

That said, the elimination of parking minimums has had impact, particularly in affordable housing. Housing that would not have been built with the old parking requirements was instead built. Downtown Hartford also had large increases in population between 2010-2020, even while the city on the whole declined in population. It also had the largest increase in housing units over this time period of any Hartford neighborhood (I would suspect because the sheer amount of vacant lots meant there was low hanging fruit).

I'm not finding 5 year rent trends very easily, but per apartments.com, year over year average rent is up 3.1% for Hartford. That is a higher rate of increase than any of CT's other 100k+ cities, New Haven, Bridgeport, Stamford, and Waterbury. Though, it is less than nearby Springfield.

All this to reinforce what I said before. Parking minimums are not the be all end all on their own. Nor is eliminating single family zoning. Nor is eliminating height restricts, design review boards, or any individual policy. We, across the country, have over time developed a robust portfolio of roadblocks to housing.

Removing parking minimums is just the start.
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Thank you for digging into this! It will take a lot of work to remove all these roadblocks to housing.
 
kdmc said:
Agreed. My point is that housing production is a Good Thing even when it doesn't lower rents for the exact place that the housing is built. Thus, neighborhood rent is a bad metric for evaluating the success of YIMBY policies on affordability. IMO, the only metric that matters for evaluating Hartford's parking minimum policy is how much housing was built.

Put another way: any housing production in New England will increase the housing supply in New England (duh), which means that it should help lower New England's average rent. However, if that infill makes a particular neighborhood (e.g. Hartford) more attractive, then it could lead to a localized demand increase for that neighborhood.

That's not an argument against good infill, although it definitely gets used as one by working class NIMBYs:
  • "the luxury apartments are going to gentrify the neighborhood!"
  • "building over the parking lots just brought in more yuppies and didn't lower our rent!"
Instead, this should be an argument for ensuring that everyone is building good infill so that the region-wide housing supply increase is able to compensate for the increased local demand. Infill Hartford and Bridgeport, but also make Glastonbury and Waterford denser. Build everywhere, not just where working- and lower-class folks live.
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There is a fundamental flaw in your approach: not everyone agrees that housing production is a Good Thing. Because housing ownership is a primary driver of wealth accumulation in the US, many home owners don't want to see more housing production because it has the potential of reducing the value of their primary source of wealth, their home.

Even progressive policy types fall victim of this trap. On one hand they promote housing development to try to get underserved communities more affordable housing. Then in the next breath, proclaim that once those communities can start purchasing housing, they can enjoy the wealth building that housing provides. Both of those situations cannot coexist.

So long as housing is promoted as the primary driver of wealth creation for the masses, many homeowners will oppose new housing production which will likely dilute their housing wealth. And homeowners tend to carry outsized levels of influence and clout in local politics (money talks).
 
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KCasiglio said:
I would push back on both how significant Hartford’s housing stock increase has been and also caution that no one municipality exists in a vacuum. Housing stock increase has been consistent with increased demand, at least downtown, and West Hartford in particular exerts some gravity on western Hartford (for lack of better phrasing).
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I looked and there is a grand total of 1 New construction unit for sale in Hartford right now. The last of a 3 unit TH they are struggling to sell. The other 2 units did sell, one to a landlord who is trying to rent it out and failing.
 
Justbuildit said:
No doubt that’s what the census data show. There are maybe 5 places in the country that have a fully built urban environment that allow for completely or mostly car free living in what could be called a City. I don’t expect there are many people with 4 kids living in multi families in Topeka. For what it’s worth I dont think people “want” to live in trailer parks, but it’s a reflection of personal economics and existing housing stock (or ability to build it).
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The trend of density correlating to low fertility is a global one.
 
kdmc said:
IMO, the only metric that matters for evaluating Hartford's parking minimum policy is how much housing was built.
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This isn't necessarily disagreement, but adding for some discussion:

- 2017 is relatively recent, takes a while to get plans/projects started, especially in places not that "hot" of a market. I'm not sure I'd expect to see that huge of a "bonus" gain from the removal of the parking minimum yet.

- Downtown Hartford percentage increases in population are a bit misleading, as the prior population of the downtown area was almost nothing. So it saw a 53% population increase, but in actual numbers that meant an increase 980 people. It's not nothing, and you absolutely have to start somewhere, it's certainly more than they'd added in the recent past otherwise.

- Hartford is struggling with some pretty rough crime/homicide rates - by my math last year was about 30/100k, or about 5.5x the national average - that's high enough to impact demand noticeably.

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Anecdotes:

I have been through Downtown Hartford (surface streets) a couple of times since 2022 both by car and by making a transfer, and it's one of the most uncomfortable feeling cities I've been through. I assume it's mildly more lively 9-5 M-F, but it feels very, very isolated from any sort of life right now.

Those experiences:

Train/bus - around 10PM - Being warned by the guard (who was in a secure booth) in the train station not to even think of opening the door to go out to the bus to BDL (which was right outside) until the bus opened it's doors to board, not to open the door if anyone tries to enter the building, and to immediately yell for him/go over to his booth if someone does try to - is not a good experience.

The experience of driving through it at night/weekends has been unsettling as well - few other cities have I been through that are so utterly deserted in large swaths of the "downtown" area.

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tl;dr - I think Hartford's starting out from a very difficult position with it's downtown, possibly a more difficult position than it looks at first glance where you see a bunch of offices + government/institutional buildings that look ok enough.
 
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