Free Parking Costs

The cluster discusses the hidden economic costs and subsidies of 'free' parking, its negative impacts on urban density, walkability, and development, and advocates for market-priced parking and eliminating minimum parking requirements.

📉 Falling 0.3x Politics & Society
3,886
Comments
20
Years Active
5
Top Authors
#3473
Topic ID

Activity Over Time

2007
1
2008
10
2009
6
2010
65
2011
21
2012
29
2013
80
2014
207
2015
131
2016
269
2017
343
2018
332
2019
399
2020
242
2021
233
2022
364
2023
478
2024
406
2025
267
2026
3

Keywords

LA US GP EUR BTW amazon.com nytimes.com www.vox TONS CA parking spaces free city car space trash pay park cities

Sample Comments

finikytou Oct 13, 2024 View on HN

do you have free parking? cities are making money out of parking spots. a lot of money. so much than one would say they have an incentive to reduce parking space to increase price and reduce expenses

iso1631 Mar 6, 2023 View on HN

Be good if the cost of car parking was accounted for. Want to have cars? You've got to have large parking lots cluttering your space with low appeal, or your buildings cost far more to build / lower density etc

nostrebored Oct 11, 2023 View on HN

The parking isn't free. It's subsidized and comes at the expense of density, walkability, and the opportunity cost of what else could've been built.

johnatthebar Feb 23, 2022 View on HN

good short video summary: https://www.vox.com/videos/2017/7/19/15993936/high-cost-of-f...

TheCoelacanth Feb 17, 2017 View on HN

Only if there is no minimum parking requirement (which there usually is). Otherwise they provided the parking space because the government compelled them to, which is a subsidy on your parking space.

ska May 18, 2021 View on HN

For reference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_High_Cost_of_Free_Parking

vonmoltke Aug 27, 2019 View on HN

Street parking doesn't need to be free.

adrianN Oct 4, 2016 View on HN

In many places in the US "free" parking is actually quite expensive. Even in the US land is expensive in some places.http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/15/business/economy/15view.ht...

0xB31B1B Dec 4, 2020 View on HN

Very few people actually need a car. The status quo in most cities is that car use is extremely subsidized through free parking. Remove the subsidy and allow people to pay the cost for their choices.

recursive Jan 23, 2021 View on HN

Probably similar to paying for parking parking spots in the first place.