A modest parking lot/ramp proposal ... to solve congestion

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Anondson
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Joined: July 21st, 2013, 8:57 pm
Location: Where West Minneapolis Once Was

A modest parking lot/ramp proposal ... to solve congestion

Postby Anondson » June 30th, 2017, 12:51 am

I came across a change in Palo Alto city employee parking policy that was designed to mimic a very successful Stanford University policy.

http://www.greencaltrain.com/2017/06/pa ... king-fees/

The Stanford policy was to take money generated by what students paid to park around campus and use some of it to fund carpool, coach commute services, transit passes, and other things. It helped reduce the solo driving from 70% to 50%.

Palo Alto is going to increase parking permits employees pay to park in city parking and create a fund to reduce solo driving in the city.

Got me thinking maybe Minneapolis could pull something like this off city wide (or maybe just downtown and university areas). The way that undesirable activities are taxed (smoking taxes don’t outlaw smoking but we use the money to mitigate the health costs on society), Minneapolis could add an annual fee on every public parking space or company granted parking space, that is put in a fund to improve transit service, carpooling, etc.

Minneapolis has a slightly different problem that the Bay Area is dealing with, Minneapolis has parking lots downtown assessed so low in value they can charge rates that induce more driving.

Cities ought to be able to take the driving induced from underpriced parking spaces and use it to help reduce driving. 40% of commuters are using mass transit to get to work, adding a fee on paid parking and corporate parking grants, that is used to improve transit feels like a policy this city could make work, and maybe right now really needs to make work.

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