Poor planning packs a peck of parking problems

Now that we’ve survived right sizing, down sizing, and no sizing (code for the last local election) it seems that one of the city of Boulder’s other more interesting public policies is getting some scrutiny.

That policy would be the now-famous “parking reduction” scheme. To those unfamiliar, historically the city of Boulder has been more lenient in allowing a larger permitted gross building envelope, provided that the developer agree to reduce the amount of onsite parking, or even better, eliminate any parking with the proposed development. Simply put, the city has decreed that if you support their war on the automobile, they will reward you with additional developable square footage. Developers don’t hate this too much; parking is expensive to build and the economic returns usually are pretty low.

One of the recent news items bringing this policy to the forefront is the city’s arbitrary decision to “reduce” the available parking at the library by 40 or so sorely needed parking spaces, the reason being that the new civic area plan intends to eliminate library parking almost entirely. Wow, that really sucks if you are disabled and can’t bike up to a bike rack. Just wishing everyone would hop on a bike makes too many presumptions and is a disingenuous way to treat those unable to Lycra their way around town. It seems like a rather random “taking” if you will, as if the city were condemning parking spaces one at a time.

And I get it, reducing tailpipe emissions and our carbon footprint are all good things, but what about the recent addition of all the electric cars on the road? Do we still continue the war on all cars? Apparently at the city of Boulder, the answer is yes. This parallels the goals established in the 2010 Boulder Valley Comprehensive Plan, which provides that regardless of any growth of population, traffic should be reduced. How exactly does the population grow and the accommodation for increased traffic not? It is kind of like saying, “If I stick my head a little further into this hole, I won’t see the virtual car that’s about to hit me.”

Starting in the late 1970s, construction in Downtown Boulder in the Central Area General Improvement District was offered a “zero” parking requirement as the city was building and providing the parking lots and garages in the downtown district. This ended in 2005 when the last city parking structure was built adjoining the St Julien Hotel. Population growth and traffic growth has not stopped. So, mystically, if we just wish the traffic will go away, it will? This, of course, is not the case.

So, where do people park when there is nowhere to park? Unfortunately, the burden of the parking reduction effort seems to have fallen on the surrounding neighborhoods. The city implemented a Neighborhood Parking Program in the late 1990s, which has made it more expensive to park in someone else’s neighborhood, but it didn’t slow it down much. It used to be that mainly the downtown neighborhoods shouldered the blow from the parking reduction mantra, but not anymore. Now, no neighborhood is immune from random parkers.

There must be a better way to accomplish our environmental goals. How about we reward those who buy electric, hybrid or alternative-fuel vehicles? Other cities have fairly abundant charging stations for electric cars; where are ours? Then, how about preferential parking for electric, hybrid, or alternative fuel? Or here’s a radical idea; There already exists at the state level an income tax credit for buying electric vehicles; how about a city sales tax credit or incentive as well?

Instead of eliminating parking and adding to the mess of congestion, how about we put our money where our mouth is and assist people out of the old technology and into the new?  Boulder has always been “cutting edge.” Time to prove that up!

Geoffrey Keys is president of Keys Commercial Real Estate in Boulder. He can be reached at keys@keys-commercial.com.

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