If Friday brings the fierce snowstorm that meteorologists have been predicting, Boston will declare an emergency, leading to a citywide scramble for parking alternatives off snow arteries. The drivers who have to move their cars will be annoyed — especially if they have to pay for pricey space in private garages. But on-street parking shouldn’t be a cheap alternative to off-street parking. Street-level space is far more valuable than concrete-covered spots 200 feet up, and parkers should pay more, not less, for the privilege of being on the ground.
Drivers view off-street and on-street parking in radically different ways, because they emerge from opposite spheres — private and public — that carry different expectations. Parking garages are built at great cost by an entrepreneur. And as the quotation from “The Godfather” goes, “Certainly, he can present a bill for such services. After all, we are not Communists.”
Comments
I whole heartedly agree. The problem is so bad I would estimate that at any given time, half of the drivers in downtown Boston have essentially already reached their destinations and are driving around and around the block looking for a space. Not only is this practice wasteful and dirty, it's dangerous because people do stupid things when they finally see an open spot. I've seen drivers go the wrong way down a one-way, cross double yellow lines, and almost run over mothers walking with strollers just to get that spot. And frequently you'll have two or sometimes three cars spot a space at the same time. Makes for hilarious street-theatre but it's really no laughing matter.
This is an interesting idea but it'll kill the annual stories on the news about parking space wars and the things that people use to hold spaces in parking space wars. I mean what will the local news talk about in such a situation ? Panic at the grocery store or maybe the media could start asking grocers why they aren't charging price premiums for food on days when blizzards are coming. I mean they could do that and from a rational perspective should do it. Seriously, I won't drive to Boston without having a specific garage in mind and I'll only do that on nights and weekends. The deterrent aren't cost and time looking for a space, they're traffic and the amazingly bad driving on display here regularly and my personal efforts to reduce my carbon footprint (oh I'm conservative about some economic stuff but I can read data and have adjusted in response). This proposal will do nothing about those. When I lived in the city, my car got abused via on street parking and it was hard to get a record of who did it so I think using some of the money generated by this for cctv cameras everywhere (like they have in Europe and that would help reduce crime) would be a very good use of money as would building dedicated bike lanes and applying some of the money generated to fund the T.
I travel quite frequently to other major cities and am thrilled to find comparatively low parking fees. It is not unusual to be able to park in a garage for $5 or $10 a day, and on the street for a pittance when one looks at what we have to pay in Boston.
Technology has made parking somewhat easier, agreed. It's a lot more convenient to use a credit card than to have to dig for quarters once one has finally found a space. (The Boston Meter Cards... don't work so well, though, in my experience. Gotta be another way!)
While the double-parked cars on Newbury, Hanover, Tremont Sts., etc., are really bothersome and at times dangerous, increasing parking fees won't resolve the issue. People will do anything to avoid paying the higher fees! By increasing parking rates, especially in high-density shopping areas, the City would negatively impact potential customers of those merchants who are already strapped. Plus, I'd bet that there would be even more double parking!!
Perhaps charging over-night street parkers a monthly/annual fee is a viable solution. However, Boston should seriously consider the consequences of dramatic parking rate increases.
Nobody double parks to avoid paying meter fees. The fine for double parking is orders of magnitude more expensive than parking in a garage. Double-parking is something people do in order to park their car in front fo a business when no nearby spaces are readily available.
And as for the "potential customers," in most downtown Boston neighborhoods, more than 70 percent of customers arrive by some method other than driving. For those customers the experience would be further improved, especially if the money and space went toward improving public transportation and bike lanes. There's really no reason to hold the majority hostage to the relatively small minority that wants to be able to bring a car to a congested area, let alone force us to subsidize it.
I couldn't disagree more.
A sharp rise in parking fees would be a boone to the suburbs and the shopping malls. Expensive parking merely forces people to make the choice to stay out of the city, which has costs to private business, which makes private business relocate to the suburbs.
A sharp rise in parking fees reserves in-city-parking to the financial elite.
The only entity to benefit would be the T, and even this is questionable because the shotage of parking does the same thing.
I spend my winters in Florida and I have seen the way parking is treated here. Guess what ? It's mostly FREE. The result is that people flock to the downtown areas and create a lively scene. Everyone benefits.
Sorry, you had a decent argument until you compared Boston to FL. Boston is a congested, dense city built before cars even existed. It didn't have the luxury of huge, sprawling parking lots. And I find it hard to compare the bustling nature of Boston to any FL city other than Miami when it comes to people flocking to downtown areas.
Sprawl is not good for economic vitality, and it forces everyone to own a car in order to get anywhere. This model is not scalable and it's hugely expensive to maintain and participate in (cars are expensive, after all). If you have the choice of making parking free OR making public transportation free (and efficient), you get far more bang-for-your-buck from the latter.
And if the public transportation is good, clean, efficient, and inviting, it encourages people to live in and travel to the city, more than offsetting the effect of sending the car owners to the suburbs.
i think that spaces in front of your tax paid residence should be available to park for free. After all you pay the property taxes. That is the premise of resident parking. I think the need for more spaces can be met by private parking garages that can use lifts as they presently do in NYC. There is no need to go this elaborate mechinsimm to raise more taxes from thjose already paying high property taxes.
Those of us who live in the city and pay the proprty tax for the parking spaces we don't use tend to disagree. And besides, it's a public subsidy towards car ownership. Why should the city (i.e. me) be paying to encourage people to own cars? We could use that space for building bike lanes or building wider sidewalks. Why shouldn't our tax dollars pay for that instead?
You don't own the road in front of your house any more than you own the sidewalk in front of your house. Sorry, it's just now how property ownership works. The road in front of your house is paved and maintained by gas taxes and the like, not your property tax.
Don't give Mumbles more bright ideas, or more revenue to feed his bloated patronage empire.
Although I don't have the time this morning to type out (Swype-out?) how the problem of "parking" is really just a symptom of a more complex societal issue (auto-centric, car-centric living), I would add that if we generally designed our lives and our infrastructure around walking and biking, we wouldn't be having these silly discussions. Think of it this way, what could you buy on Newbury Street (or Walmart) if all the money you spend on your vehicle in one year were added to your bank account? Car payment or repairs on an older model, oil, front and rear differential fluid, transmission fluid, tires, batteries, wiper fluid, tolls, registration and other licencing fees, excise tax, labor costs for repairs, gasoline, wiper-blades, parking, car insurance, liability insurance, the list goes on and on. On average here in the Boston area I'll bet people spend somewhere in the neighborhood of six hundred dollars per month on their cars. What could you buy with $7200?
Yeah, I know...another car.
Let me guess, you live in the city. Try living in the suburbs or a rural area without a car. Newsflash to the good people of Boston -- Massachusetts extends out past 495.
I find the title to this article, "Boston's plague of cheap parking," to be misleading and not relevant to the underlying story. Has anyone ever estimated the expense of "lost" parking spaces caused by snow and the occupants' actions in leaving their cars unmoved just to save spots? I say ban all "resident permit parking only" for all hours of the day and limit resident parking to certain hours. Turnover of spaces should be the goal.
Good luck with that. It would make car ownership in huge swaths of Boston basically impossible.
Using the logical of "If you build it , they will come", my conclusion is that the building of additional garages and parking lots will only exacerbate the existing problems in the city. The perception that parking will be easier to find (whatever the price) will only induce more people to attempt access to the city at all hours. This will result, of course, in more congestion. And many of those extra vehicles will show up looking for cheap on-street parking, on the assumption that all other drivers will head for parking garages, making that on-street parking more available.
As an earler writer so correctly pointed out, property owners do not own the street, the parking spaces, or the sidewalks in front of their properties. And, while the city may (?) own the roads upon which they have placed meters, it is everybody's road (gas) taxes that eventually filter down to maintain and repair those roads. Quite franky, it is aggravating to think that I maintain a pipeline from which the city (any city for that matter) derives revenues---from meters, parking tickets, etc. Automobile owners pay for the streets, pay to park on those streets, and pay parking tickets to entity that makes the laws governing parking spaces.
Maybe it is time to privatize all the on-street parking spaces and let the free market determine what it is worth. Let the city, if they actually own those parking spaces, sell them to the highest bidder and get out of the parking space business. Then we will see what a parking space is truly worth. And, guess what? Private parking companies will make sure spaces are accessible because their profit and loss sheets demand it.
I doubt, however, that the city would make such a bold move. Parking revenue from meters and tickets is too much of a cash cow, propping up its revenue stream. Also, the city would lose excise tax money as people decide to forego auto ownership when they finally realize the truer cost of ownership
I own a car and live in the city Boston and pay for the luxury of parking thru taxes on my property and on my car.. If I could find a job in the city maybe I could get rid of my car but with lack of jobs in the city I need to drive to my job. Charging too much for parking does keep people away from the city, we should do much more to encourage everyone to come to city by car and by a trust worthy MBTA. (lol)
IF bikes want more for city services they should pay for it and respect the current laws!
Parking is a straightforward supply-and-demand problem. The supply of on-street parking is fixed. The demand can be manipulated by setting the appropriate price. Businesses want customers/clients in the store/office, not circling the block endlessly looking for parking. The price should be high enough (lowering the demand enough) so that there is usually one open spot in an area. That means that all the people who want a spot and are willing to pay for it can find one. Econ 101.
A high price also encourages turnover - people will only stay in a spot as long as they really need it. I know retail and restaurant workers for whom it is cheaper to feed the meter while at work than pay for a garage. This doesn't do anyone any good.
For people who have more time than money and don't mind circling the block for 20 minutes to save a couple dollars, higher parking prices will push them towards chooing public transportation. For $2 plus their available free time they can be on the T or in a bus rather than congesting our streets.
Calls for higher parking prices aren't to punish automobile drivers and isn't a scheme for a public transportation utopia. Higher parking prices will improve the driving and parking experience for drivers and is an important part of a sensible transportation policy that works for everyone.
I think we should charge liberals more. The more moonbatty you are, the higher the fee. Push as many of them as possible onto bikes. Make'em put their money where their mouth is.
Har har har, I funnneeeeee!
Some people want and need to live in the suburbs. I don't want to live in an apartment with no privacy or space and can't afford a decent house in Boston. However I still want to come in to the city and spend my money. Reasonable parking fees are fine I like the idea of central square where parking meters in the parking areas are charged up to 10pm. I pay it with no problem but making parking impossible means I don't come in to Boston to spend money or support local arts. How can that be good for anyone. We need reasonable parking to allow Boston to thrive.
Boston needs more public parking facilities that charge reasonable prices. It would re-energize the downtown. I go into downtown Boston only if there are no alternatives.
But that's the thing, they ARE charging reasonable rates. The rates are clearly reasonable enough that enough people pay those rates to make it profitable. If the garages were having trouble convincing people to park there at those rates, they would drop them to try and attract more business. Supply and demand. They may lose your supply, but there's obviously enough pent up demand to result in the current rates.
Comrade Glaeser if the Bourgeios can afford a vehicle they must pay? Are you really that out of touch to think parking in Boston can be simplified by raising rates?. Last time I checked the government has now gone through my pocket and is looking to get into my socks. Get back on your bike and pedal back over to Cambridge. The City of Boston has continously built big buildings and added retail which draw worker bees into the city. Most can't afford to bring the vehicle and park unless it is a perk or they want to waste money. The downside is you can go to JFK and take a look at all of the commuters that are parked there on side streets or any other T station for that matter. You can not find a space at any of the T garages. Parking on the street is more valuable. Yeah I like people sidesiping my car backing into it etc. Boston has a ton to offer unfortunately you cant get there from here. Boston draws people in takes there money. Businesses pay the city taxes The meter maids make a killing for the city it's a win win. Since no one seems to be making parking spaces and demand far exceeds supply lets just charge more that solves the problem.
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The idea that each parking spot should be a profit center in isolation misses the point of why we get together to create infrastructure. A parking spot isn’t valuable in itself. The value comes from what it enables. Without parking businesses would have no customers. They pay for the parking spot by paying taxes. Parking spaces at malls are generally “free”, that is, not funded by charging for use of the space.
The idea of congestion pricing in order to keep the space available makes some sense. So much so that that was an original reason for parking meters – rather than as a source of revenue. We mustn’t confuse the two agendas and lose sight of the larger goal of making our cities work as a whole rather than as simply a disconnected collection of parts.
The concept within this article is utter garbage:In down town Santa Barbara there is free parking for two hours, which is available in many of the Pacific coast line cities. Whereas in Boston and the surrounding communities the residents must pay an annual automobile tax, resident sticker fees, visitor parking passes, rental for space if you wish to have a holiday party, and also pay the meter charges from 8am to 8pm when residents take their vehicles off their property and park on the streets! Needless to say, the residents also pay land taxes which increase annually.
Santa Barbara also does not have subways or commuter rails. It is not as dense as Boston, nor does it have the inherent constraints of a city built before cars existed. Not exactly a good comparison.
There are 5.4 million motor vehicles registered in a state with just 6.4 million people (including children). In 1980, there were 3.7 million motor vehicles with a population 5.7 million people. Seems to me the problem isn't too few parking spaces, but too many cars.