Rachel Weinberger
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Free Parking Isn’t Free — But Upper West Side Car Owners Want To Keep It That Way
Entitled drivers bristle at a community board forum that envisions better uses for public space than car storage.
October 30, 2019
American Cities Are Chipping Away at the Burden of Parking Mandates
For people who live in cities with good transit, the decision to drive or take the bus or train often comes down to parking. If parking is cheap and abundant, more people will drive. And yet transit-rich cities across the United States, including NYC, continue to require parking in new developments.
June 27, 2017
DCP Flubs Research on How Off-Street Parking Affects Traffic
In its latest parking report, the Department of City Planning claimed that residential off-street parking is not linked to increased driving, contradicting previous research. In response, the parking policy experts who produced that research are reprimanding the agency for jumping to conclusions based on insufficient evidence. The flub by DCP could have big consequences, because it undermines part of the rationale for eliminating parking mandates.
February 21, 2014
Unhealthy “Foods”: Huge Whole Foods Parking Lot Will Discourage Walking
The proposed Gowanus Whole Foods is moving forward after eight years of planning and debate, following a vote by the NYC Board of Standards and Appeals today. With it will come a 248-space surface parking lot: a semi-suburban design plunked down amidst some of Brooklyn's most walkable neighborhoods.
February 28, 2012
NYC Parking Requirements Make More Traffic, New Research Confirms
Evidence continues to mount that New York City's mandatory parking minimums encourage people to drive.
February 28, 2012
PlaNYC 2.0 Reactions: Rachel Weinberger, UPenn Professor
Streetsblog has been gathering responses to last week's release of PlaNYC 2.0. This is the fourth installment. Read the first, second, and third parts.
April 26, 2011
New Domino Drops 266 Parking Spaces. How Low Can It Go?
How few parking spaces should be attached to new developments to make New York a more sustainable city?
June 14, 2010
Fun Facts About the Sad State of Parking Policy
Surface parking stretches halfway to the horizon in the heart of downtown Wichita, Kansas. Image: Wichita Walkshop via Flickr. If you haven’t checked out the ITDP parking report we covered yesterday, it’s a highly readable piece of research, walking you through parking policy’s checkered past and potentially brighter future. In addition to describing six cases … Continued
February 24, 2010
Want to Foster Walking, Biking and Transit? You Need Good Parking Policy
The high-water mark for American parking policy came in the early 1970s, when cities including New York, Boston, and Portland set limits on off-street parking in their downtowns. They were compelled to do so by lawsuits brought under the Clean Air Act, which used the lever of parking policy to curb traffic and reduce pollution from auto emissions. This level of innovation went unmatched over the ensuing three-and-a-half decades. Only now are American cities implementing effective new parking strategies that cut down on traffic.
February 23, 2010
The Next New York: How the Planning Department Sabotages Sustainability
This is the second installment in a three-part series on the
reshaping of New York City and its consequences for sustainability and
livable streets. Read the first part here.
February 19, 2010