Skip to Content
Streetsblog California home
Streetsblog California home
Log In
Streetsblog USA

America Builds Way Too Much Parking Near Transit

At Oakland’s Fruitvale Village transit-oriented development, car trips and parking usage are far lower than what industry standards anticipated. Photo: Eric Fredericks via Flickr

It's an open secret that American engineering and planning standards call for too much parking at developments near transit. Now a new study from Smart Growth America and Reid Ewing at the University of Utah quantifies how much extraneous parking gets built for projects that are supposed to support walking and transit.

Industry standards like the Institute of Transportation Engineers' Parking Generation Manual are based on suburban models that overestimate the number of car trips generated by mixed-use development and development near transit.

The new study looked at parking occupancy at five transit-oriented development sites (TODs) around the country and found a scandalous amount of empty space, Transportation for America reports.

peak_parking_occupancy
These TODs include fewer parking spaces than industry standards recommend, and those spaces still never fill up. Table: Smart Growth America

Even when developers built fewer parking spots than the ITE standards recommend, they still built too many. Here are the topline numbers from the report [PDF] summarizing the research:

With so many other ways to get to these stations, it is not surprising that fewer people drove to these TODs than ITE’s guidelines expect. The developers of these TODs recognized this, and built parking accordingly. All TODs included in this study built less parking than recommended by ITE -- between 23 to 61 percent of ITE’s guidelines.

Yet even this reduced amount of parking was not used to capacity: peak occupancy fell below actual capacity supplied. The ratio of demand to actual supply was between 58 and 84 percent. The actual parking supply was less than recommended supply according to ITE, and the actual peak occupancy was much less than the ITE supply guidelines, in a range between only 19 to 46 percent.

Fewer vehicle trips is one likely reason why parking occupancy rates were lower than ITE’s recommendations. Another reason is that parking is shared between commercial and residential uses at two TODs, is shared between transit and park-and-ride uses at one TOD, is unbundled with apartment rents at two TODs, and is priced at market rates for commercial users at three TODs.

afsd
The number of car trips at these TODs comes in much lower than the standard model predicted. Table: SGA
false

More recommended reading: Seattle Transit Blog reports that local infrastructure boosters say Seattle should stand firm in its commitment to protecting immigrants, regardless of whether it hurts local budgets. And NRDC reports on Georgia's new solar roadway.

Stay in touch

Sign up for our free newsletter

More from Streetsblog California

Friday’s Headlines

New, wider sidewalks in SF's Tenderloin; Environmental groups sue CARB over biofuels; Biden sets national climate goals; More

December 20, 2024

E-bike Incentive Launch a “Mess”?

CARB said there were something like 100,000 people trying to grab 1,500 vouchers. No wonder people are frustrated. Does that mean the launch was bungled? Also, did you successfully apply for a voucher? If so, we'd love to hear from you

December 20, 2024

Friday Video: Traveling Without the Car

City Nerd focuses on the cities where it's easiest to get into town without a car.

December 20, 2024

Cemeteries Push to Bury Forest Lawn Drive Safety Improvements

Forest Lawn and Mount Sinai reps call scaled-back city street improvements a "bad plan" and "permanent traffic disaster"

December 20, 2024
See all posts