July 2018

UF campus to lose 600 parking spaces as construction of new parking begins

by Deena S. Hawkins on July 30, 2018

Parking on the University of Florida campus is about to become much more restricted.

Approximately 600 parking spaces will be demolished in November as construction of a new parking garage is scheduled to begin in the northern section of the suburban lot on Gale Lemerand Drive, leaving an urgent need for temporary parking.

The new garage will have approximately 1,900 parking spaces in total when complete, but the net long-term gain will be minimal due to other planned construction projects, said Scott Fox, director of transportation and parking services.

The Commuter Lot garage will not be finished until February 2020. In the meantime, TAPS is exploring some temporary parking options to compensate for the loss of spaces which will be discussed at the next meeting of the Parking and Transportation Committee in the coming weeks. .

“I can’t give you a timeline for any of them yet, but I can tell you that when the northern part of the suburban lot closes in November 2018, I better have other places to go. park, ”he said.

James Humphrey, a UF junior who parked in the suburban lot this summer semester, said the subclasses would suffer the most from the suburban lot closing because it is one rare lots in the center of the campus where their decals allow them. to park.

“I don’t know how it will work. They might have to reroute some bus lines or something just to get people to and from, ”Humphrey said. “I can’t imagine where on campus they would have even put more temporary parking, so I feel like it would have to be even further from the center of campus.”

Erin Patrick, an assistant research professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at UF, will lose her usual parking spot in front of the Union Reitz in the spring of 2019, when the engineering lot is due to be demolished to make way for the new data science and information technology center. . She said it’s hard enough to find parking near the center of the campus, and if UF wants to cut that many parking spaces for staff, they have to find a way to replace them quickly.

“It was a bag of mixed blessings,” said Patrick. “I’m excited about the new infrastructure, but worry about getting to class on time to teach. “

The budget for the garage is $ 32.4 million, or about $ 17,900 per space.

Fox said the new garage is needed because of the campus projects and new buildings that have replaced the parking spaces. The Commuter Lot Garage is how TAPS replaces what has been lost, as well as what will be lost in the near future.

The following list illustrates the projected loss of parking based on projects already planned, according to Fox. While not all projects have a start date, the first three have already started or are expected to start within the next year.

Pony Field Lot – 101 places – June 2018
Gale Lemerand Promenade North Suburb Lot – 600 – November 2018
Engineering land (opposite Reitz Union) – 351 – May 2019
Gale Lemerand Drive South Suburb Lot – 472 – TBD
Interior road – 128 – To be determined
Lot Frazier Rogers – 162 – To be determined

The six projects collectively leave an expected loss of approximately 1,800 spaces on campus, including the 600 spaces in the North Suburb Lot. Fox said the new garage would reverse those losses with 1,900 spaces, but not until its completion in 2020.

A map of all UF car parks currently under demolition. (Matthew Arrojas / WUFT News)

“If there is anything that we want to convey to the university community, it is that it is happening and we know it and we are preparing for it,” he said. “Your experience during the construction process and once the garage is open is important to us. This is why we are trying to make good decisions now.

Temporary car parks

Fox said TAPS currently has five temporary parking plans, pending approval. The plans range from small car parks of just 100 spaces to much larger car parks of more than 500.

The larger lot proposed would provide 532 spaces at Fifield Field and cost TAPS approximately $ 1.5 million. The smallest lot would be on the east side of 13th Street and offer 105 spaces at a cost of $ 250,000, according to the presentation of Fox.

The following five proposed lots would provide 1,233 temporary parking spaces:

13e Rue Est – 105 spaces – $ 250,000
Norman field – 196 – $ 525,000
Archer Road Field – 277 – $ 1.2 million
Fifield Field – 532 – $ 1.5 million
Flavet Field – 123 – $ 375,000

Fox stressed that none of those plans have yet been approved and that some may not go into effect at all. Others, like the Fifield Field, could be built but with less space than what is currently proposed.

In total, the lots would cost around $ 3.9 million to build. Fox is hoping that a plan for the temporary lots will be solidified before the start of the fall semester.

City and UF agreement limit total number of parking spaces on campus

While the Commuter Lot garage will make up for lost spaces in 2020, it won’t do much to increase the amount of parking available on campus as a whole. Fox said it was because of the Campus development agreement UF produced with the city of Gainesville.

The agreement caps the maximum number of parking spaces UF can have at 25,377. Fox said the agreement was put in place because the roads around UF, such as Archer Road and University Avenue, are not equipped for. manage the traffic created by more parking spaces.

“If we were to build 5,000 additional parking spaces and generate 5,000 additional trips, single occupant vehicle trips in the morning and 5,000 additional trips in the evening, these already failing roads would absolutely choke,” he said. he declares.

Due to the agreement, the supply of parking spaces has remained stagnant over the past 20 years. According to Fox’s presentation, the parking lot in 1998 was the same as in 2018, with a range of 23,000 to 24,000 spaces.

Meanwhile, parking demand continues to reach all-time highs, Fox said.

For the 2016-17 school year, 36,440 automotive decals were issued. That’s about 13,000 more decals than there are actual parking spots on campus.

The current campus development agreement is in effect until 2025 but will be reviewed in 2020. Fox said it is possible that increasing demand will cause the cap to increase, but it is still far too early to make any predictions. .

“Obviously,” he said, “when the parking supply remains essentially stable and the demand continues to rise and we issue more and more parking stickers, it becomes more and more. more difficult to have a satisfactory parking experience. “

Parking spaces

In some US cities, there are more than ten times as many parking spaces as households

by Deena S. Hawkins on July 18, 2018

If you’ve ever attended a city council meeting, you know people love to complain about the lack of parking. People want to be able to park their cars as close to the front door of the place they are trying to visit as possible. Such complaints create an artificial impression that parking is scarce.

But according to a new report by the Research Institute for Housing America, a branch of the Mortgage Bankers Association, cities actually have a parking glut. They are also very bad at estimating their real parking space needs. Worse still, all the land dedicated to cars contributes to skyrocketing home values, which excludes low-income renters and buyers from the market.

The study, “Quantified Parking: Comprehensive Parking Inventories for Five US Cities,” counted parking spaces in five cities: New York, Seattle, Philadelphia, Iowa’s capital, Des Moines, and Jackson, Wyoming. The Earl is the first of its kind; according to the report, “comprehensive parking inventories have never existed for U.S. cities.”

The study found that parking in the United States represents billions of dollars of public and private investment. In New York alone, parking is worth $20.6 billion and is controlled by a handful of companies.

The city of Jackson, Wyoming (population 10,000) has a 27:1 ratio of parking spaces to households, according to the report, and yet a decade ago it spent $17 million on a parking structure. parking lot that offers exclusively free parking.

“When a preconception of too few parking spaces infects policy makers, more parking spaces tend to be built and provided for free to everyone,” wrote Eric Scharnhorst, senior data scientist at the startup. Parking and the author of the study.

Read more: Parking lots are an incredible waste of space. Here’s how to end it

American drivers spend on average 17 hours per year looking for the perfect parking spot, and most cars in the US are parked 95% of the time.

But scooping up valuable land for car storage has the effect of driving up the cost of land for housing, according to experts in the world: it is more lucrative to operate a car park than a home. This is ideal for property owners looking to make a return on their investments, but it makes real estate markets inhospitable to new buyers and tenants.

As the report notes (and as real estate websites confirm), the median selling price of a home in Jackson hovers around $1 million. According to a local real estate company, 2017 marked the city’s lowest real estate inventory in 30 years.

This dynamic was evident in most of the cities studied in the report. Seattle has more than twice as many parking spaces as it really needs, while Philly has nearly four parking spaces for every house. Des Moines has 83,141 homes, 217,000 people and 1.6 million parking spaces, or 19 spaces per household.

Of all the cities featured in the report, only New York, the most densely populated city in the United States, had a reasonable ratio of parking spaces per household. “There are an average of 16.2 households per acre and 10.1 parking spaces per acre in New York City,” Scharnhorst wrote.

In crowded cities where rents are rising, cities will increasingly be faced with a dilemma: parking or housing? Just this week in Silicon Valley, the city of Palo Alto – which, as the headquarters of Google, Tesla and many other technology companies, has one of the largest concentrations of wealth in the world – voted to allow people living in motorhomes to park on city property. During this time, a bill in San Francisco that would allow its transit operator to build housing over station properties is currently before the California legislature. (Don’t get too excited. California also recently shot down a bill this would have allowed for more residential construction near public transportation.)

However, these are only palliative measures. As the report suggests, cities should conduct regular parking audits to diagnose current car storage supplies and prescribe a more sensible solution to a looming housing crisis.

What a lot of cities really need is to become more affordable, and that’s done in part by maximizing the zoning of land for housing, as well as promoting public transit.

Solve Motherboard’s weekly internet-themed crossword: Solve Internet.

Parking spaces

Des Moines has 83,000 households and 1.6 million parking spaces

by Deena S. Hawkins on July 13, 2018

Des Moines has seven times more parking spaces than people, according to a new study from the Mortgage Bankers Association.

The Research Institute for Housing America arm of the association reviewed parking inventories in Des Moines, New York, Philadelphia, Seattle and Jackson, Wyoming. He found a “large amount of parking”.

Des Moines has 1.6 million parking spaces, according to the study. This represents around seven parking spaces for each of the city’s 217,521 residents in 2017.

The report argues that cities have made “monumental investments in parking”. And he says the results come at a time when people are driving less and parking demand is declining.

Cars drive past a parking lot on Third Avenue in downtown Des Moines on Friday, July 13, 2018. According to a recent study, Des Moines has a large number of parking spaces.

In Des Moines, city leaders recognize that driving and parking behaviors are changing. In response, the city has exempted many projects from its minimum parking requirements on new developments. And a new change in the city’s zoning code further relaxes parking rules.

Following:

“My conclusion is quite basic: the investment in parking really exceeds the current parking demand, which is really interesting,” said Eric Scharnhorst, author of the report. “Because future demand will likely continue to decline. “

The study valued the parking infrastructure in Des Moines at $ 6.42 billion. He counted the total number of spaces in surface lots, residential driveways, on-street parking and private parking garages within the city limits of Des Moines.

Scharnhorst, start-up manager Parkingmill, says an oversupply of parking spaces means city leaders have the opportunity to rethink the uses of many dedicated parking lots, which are often found in desirable areas of the city.

“It’s just a really big opportunity in Des Moines. The occupancy rates are pretty low. But the inventory is really high,” he said. “Often the parking spaces are in very convenient places because you want to get to where you want to go. “

“We must take a step back as a city”

Scharnhorst’s study used a mix of high-resolution satellite images as well as data from property tax assessors, city departments and large institutions.

The study found that 83 percent of Des Moines parking spaces are in off-street parking lots and driveways; 10 percent are on the streets; and 7 percent are housed in structured off-street parking.

Of the five cities examined, Des Moines had one of the highest household-to-parking space ratios, with 19.4 spaces for each household in the city. Jackson had the largest with 27.1 places for each household and New York had the lowest ratio with 0.6 places for each household.

Philadelphia was houses 2.1 million parking spaces – 500,000 more than the 1.6 million stalls in Des Moines. With around 1.5 million residents, the city of Philadelphia is nearly seven times the size of Des Moines.

Larry James Jr., a real estate attorney in Des Moines who works with developers, said the numbers indicate a need to rethink the city’s approach to parking.

“We need to take a step back as a city,” said James.

He knows people are still complaining about parking, having trouble finding a spot on Court Avenue, or having to park three blocks from their East Village destination.

But it’s all relative: “The reality is that when you go to Jordan Creek Mall, you don’t think about walking three or four blocks when you go to the movies because you can see the front door,” he said. he declared.

James advocates letting the local market determine how much parking is required, rather than establishing “arbitrary” bylaws that impose minimum spaces in new developments.

He wants Des Moines to join the ranks of cities that waive parking requirements absolutely.

This is what the City has done in the city center where no minimum parking requirement applies. Yet, new projects are always offered with parking structures due to market demand, he said.

“That doesn’t mean we don’t need parking. We need it,” he said. “But let businesses figure out what they need.”

“The market will always dictate that there is parking”

Des Moines is working on building an urban infrastructure that is more cyclable and more pedestrianized. But cars are still king in the capital of Iowa.

“Hopefully there will be less demand and need to drive or park,” said Michael Ludwig, planning administrator for Des Moines. “But these are big ticket items. There is a lot of sidewalk space. There are a lot of streets that don’t have bike lanes. And in the meantime, people will still have to drive.”

But the city has already taken a new approach to parking.

Ludwig said developments are routinely exempt from minimum parking standards. This includes the new Soll apartment complex on Ingersoll Street.

And a new suite of zoning code changes propose to permanently reduce parking regulations.

Current code requires most new multi-family developments to include 1.5 parking spaces for each residential unit. The proposed new zoning code would reduce the requirements to one space per unit, Ludwig said.

Too much parking has real implications: it can drive up development costs (and therefore rental prices). And that can affect the stormwater drainage rate, Ludwig said.

“We think our current standards are too high, so we are proposing adjustments,” he said. “Whether or not there is political support from the community so that there is no minimum everywhere, I don’t know. “

That’s because many small businesses along commercial corridors are surrounded by dense residential neighborhoods, creating real parking and traffic problems, Ludwig said.

Whatever the city does, Ludwig doesn’t expect developers to abandon parking lots and garages anytime soon. Many grocery stores and big box retailers are already above the city minimum, he said.

“Just because you don’t have a minimum parking ratio doesn’t mean there won’t be parking,” he said. “The market is always going to dictate that there are parking lots. And they are always going to build parking lots.”

Parking facilities

500 of SpotHero’s parking lots in Chicago are now ready for self-driving cars

by Deena S. Hawkins on July 10, 2018

PHOTO VIA SHUTTERSTOCK

No one expects an automaker to create a fully self-driving car overnight. But when that day comes SpotHero will be ready.

The parking technology company announced today that more than 500 of its facilities in Chicago are now ready for autonomous vehicles.

These garages, lots, and other facilities are equipped with license plate recognition technology, IoT sensors, and other hardware that, when combined with SpotHero’s software, allows an autonomous vehicle to find a garage, to access it and to pay, all without the need for human assistance. .

SpotHero is primed for autonomous vehicles to hit city streets. »

“SpotHero is primed for autonomous vehicles to hit city streets – and parking lots,” said CEO Mark Lawrence. “By combining existing physical parking infrastructure with our digital infrastructure, these AV-ready garages offer a real glimpse into what the future of urban mobility parking looks like.”

The hardware and software needed to create a fully autonomous vehicle is complex and expensive. Based on an article by Quartz as of March 2017, a fully self-driving car could cost $250,000 to build. It turns out that preparing parking lots and parking lots for self-driving cars is no small feat either.

“The parking industry is extremely fragmented,” said Elan Mosbacher, senior vice president of strategy and operations. “One of the things we’re focused on is taking this fragmented industry with thousands of players using dozens of types of hardware and software and making it really easy for an equipment manufacturer to get into it. origin or an autonomous vehicle company.”

SpotHero has had its eye on self-driving cars and their parking needs for some time. In an interview with Built In last March, Lawrence said the company is investing in autonomous vehicle and smart city technologies. The company also opened an office in Detroit last fall to get closer to its partners in the automotive industry.

According to Mosbacher, half of SpotHero’s parking lots in Chicago are now compatible with self-driving vehicles. No timeline was given for when the other half of the company’s garages and lots in Chicago would be ready for self-driving vehicles, or when this program would expand to the thousands of other garages and company lots. distributed across the country.

“The biggest question is on the driverless side – when will autonomous vehicles be ready?” asked Mosbacher. “Right now it’s a proof of concept in Chicago for today. But it’s something we can roll out nationally once we’ve proven the driver and once the automakers are more advanced in their development.

Parking spaces

Spokane Airport adds 1,300 parking spaces to accommodate growth

by Deena S. Hawkins on July 10, 2018

Responding to rapid growth, Spokane International Airport is expanding its parking lot by 1,300 spaces.

The 12-acre lot expansion will take place near the cell phone waiting area. It will be built in the west bend of the land at the intersection of West Airport Drive and McFarlane Road. The lot is expected to open in November.

Currently, the airport has almost 8,000 parking spaces in its garages, in economy class, in concourse C and on the outdoor grounds. The new batch will bring this total to 9,236 places.

Airport spokesman Todd Woodard said the airport board has yet to determine pricing for the lot, but said it will be an extension of the lot economy serviced by airport shuttles.

Current rates for the existing economy lot are $4 per day, which includes free shuttle service. Parking garages are $10 per day, with outdoor parking $8 per day and parking in Concourse C $7.50 per day.

The perceived need for new space is driven by the surge in passenger numbers at the airport, Woodard said. From 2011 to 2014, the airport handled approximately 3 million incoming and outgoing passengers per year. That number has steadily increased since, with more than 3.5 million passengers in 2017.

The growth has led to the recent expansion of the Concours A and B security checkpoint. A fifth lane has been added to accommodate the 25% increase in the number of people screened by the security checkpoint at the main gates airport since 2015, according to the Transportation Security Administration.

Airlines have also noticed the popularity of the airport. Alaska Airlines has announced it will launch direct service to San Diego this fall, and Frontier Airlines will offer twice-weekly nonstop service to Las Vegas from Spokane starting in August. Frontier recently returned to Spokane Airport after a three-year hiatus, with flights to and from Denver four times a week – Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday.

In April, the airport’s board approved a $2.8 million design contract with Architectural Alliance International – whose team includes Wolfe Architectural Group, TO Engineers and WSP USA Inc. – for the project. renovation and expansion of the terminal. It is one of the first steps in the airport’s $130 million reconstruction project to accommodate passenger growth by expanding terminals, remodeling security checkpoints and adding a central hall baggage claim.

Work on the new car park has begun. It is being made by NA Degerstrom Inc. of Spokane Valley, which submitted a bid of $6.4 million, the lowest of three bids received.

Parking facilities

500 of SpotHero’s Chicago parking lots now ready for self-driving cars

by Deena S. Hawkins on July 10, 2018

PHOTO VIA SHUTTERSTOCK

No one expects an automaker to create a fully autonomous car overnight. But when that day comes, SpotHero will be ready.

The parking technology company today announced that more than 500 of its facilities in Chicago are now ready for autonomous vehicles.

These garages, grounds and other facilities are equipped with license plate recognition technology, IoT sensors and other hardware that, when combined with SpotHero’s software, enables an autonomous vehicle to find a vehicle. garage, access and pay, all without the need for human assistance. .

SpotHero is ready to welcome autonomous vehicles on the streets of the city.

“SpotHero is prepared for autonomous vehicles to hit city streets – and parking lots,” CEO Mark Lawrence said. “By combining the existing physical infrastructure of parking lots with our digital infrastructure, these AV-ready garages offer a real-world glimpse of what the future of parking for urban mobility looks like. “

The hardware and software required to create a fully autonomous vehicle are complex and expensive. From an article by Quartz As of March 2017, a fully autonomous car could cost $ 250,000 to build. It turns out that preparing parking lots and parking lots for self-driving cars is not an easy task either.

“The parking industry is very fragmented,” said Elan Mosbacher, senior vice president of strategy and operations. “One of the things we’re focusing on is taking this fragmented industry with thousands of players who use dozens of types of hardware and software and making it really simple for an original equipment manufacturer or an autonomous vehicle company. “

SpotHero has had an eye on self-driving cars and their parking needs for some time. In an interview with Built In last March, Lawrence said the company is investing in autonomous vehicle and smart city technologies. The company also opened an office in Detroit last fall to get closer to its partners in the automotive industry.

According to Mosbacher, half of SpotHero’s parking lots in Chicago are now compatible with autonomous vehicles. No timeline has been given as to when the other half of the company’s garages and lots in Chicago will be ready for autonomous vehicles, or when this program will be extended to the thousands of other garages and lots. of the company spread across the country.

“The biggest question is on the autonomous vehicle side: when will the autonomous vehicles be ready? Mosbacher asked. “Right now it’s a proof of concept in Chicago for today. But it’s something we can roll out nationally once we prove the pilot and after the automakers move forward with their development. “