More parking = more cars = gridlock
I attended a Transportation Authority workshop last night on its new Mobility, Access, and Pricing Study (which, among other things, might recommend a fee to drive downtown, just like London, Rome, and Stockholm have) -- and I came away more convinced than ever that San Francisco is screwed if downtown greedheads fool people into approving Prop. H and defeating Prop. A.
Ours is one of five U.S. cities selected to collectively receive almost $1 billion in federal money to study and implement ways of reducing traffic congestion. Why? Because we're the second most congested downtown in the country after Los Angeles. Preliminary studies show traffic congestion cost San Francisco $2.3 billion in 2005 (in delays, fuel, health impacts, and slowed commerce), congestion consistently ranks as people's top concern in surveys, traffic has slowed our transit system to a crawl, congestion roughly doubles travel times, and half our city's greenhouse gas emissions come from cars. And if Prop. H is approved, there will be unfettered new parking construction, putting up to 20,000 new cars on our clogged roads, according to the Planning Department. This is madness!
I'm baffled why the Chamber of Commerce supports this because the evidence is clear it will hurt business (perhaps they're just blinded to reality by their slavishly doctrinaire devotion free markets and hatred of all things government). Study after study shows that more parking draws more cars, and in our built-out city, where there's no room for creating more lanes, that means more traffic congestion. And therefore slower Muni, which will cause more people to want to drive or ride bikes, which will cause even more congestion -- a feedback loop that leads to gridlock. C'mon everybody, think about this stuff for a second because it isn't rocket science. You can support more traffic or better transit, your choice.
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Comments (2)
That's same way it is where I live too. They keep taking away downtown parking but the public transit isn't getting better either. May be they need to make that better too and cheaper too...Thanks for this post.
Posted by JC Carvill | October 18, 2007 01:35 PM
I disagree with your formula
"More parking = more cars = gridlock"
For a start you are not actually adding to traffic, you are just better facilitating the existing traffic by providing somewhere to park. That way you reduce the number of cars parked illegally. You have to use carrot and stick.
I see it this way...
Less parking=more out of town shopping centres=closure of unique businesses and loss of city centre community
I live in Yorkshire town that pedestrianised all the streets. A decade later and now one in three shops is boarded up, the food market hall has closed and all its done is shift the people to the retail parks on the outskirts where they can park.
This has killed all the passing trade for all the unique taverns because no-one goes shopping in bradford anymore. All we have left are identikit chainshops you find anywhere.
If you want to beat congestion you have to give tax breaks to businesses who facilitate and encourage home working. How many jobs these days can be done form anywhere with a good broadband connection?
Posted by Peter North | October 18, 2007 03:02 PM