March 2020

Parking is sometimes a headache. Now that Birmingham city center is full of new businesses, restaurants, apartments and hotels, where are we going to park? Well, we’re just lucky. The city’s design review board just gave the go-ahead for a new downtown parking deck and we’ve got the scoop.

New parking platform? Where?

According to Birmingham Business Journal, Ascent Hospitality Management will build a new patio at 1901 1st Ave. N. just across from Jemison Flats. It’s the same company that refurbished the Elyton Hotel and is developing Macaroni Lofts, so you know the project is in good hands.

The new terrace will add 10 more levels with 720 downtown parking spaces. For my urban planning aficionados, the plan is to build, not to leave. There is currently a two-storey public car park there and it is about to get much bigger.

The car park is in an extremely busy part of the city center and the extra parking will certainly benefit many of us. Now you can park closer to your favorite hangouts like:

• Elyton Hotel
• The Pizitz
• brick and tin
• Bistro V
• Trattoria Zaza
• Primal Helm
• McWane Center
• Alabama Theater
• Atomic Lounge
• railway park

Here is a preview of the new plan

Before

After

The future of parking in Birmingham city center

This parking lot is a huge win for the city. If you’re like me, you give up trying to find a parking spot after 2-3 circles around the block. Also, who has a handful of neighborhoods available to them 24/7? It’s simple. Good parking gets people out.

Fortunately, Birmingham is looking to introduce ParkMobile, a free app that allows users to pay for parking on their phone. It would make parking easier.

How do you think the City of Birmingham should continue to address parking issues? Let us know on social media @BhamNow.

Across America, driving larger vehicles comes up against physical limitations. SUVs and pickup trucks are getting so big that they have a hard time fitting into some homes, parking garages, and public parking spots.

Owners may have to think twice about buying bigger vehicles as parking lot operators start charging oversized fees to accommodate giant SUVs and trucks.

SUVs like the Chevrolet Suburban and Ford Expedition and pickup trucks like Fiat Chrysler’s Ram are examples of popular vehicles in the United States that have grown in popularity in recent years, testing parking limits.

When Kristen Trevino recently moved into her new home in the Dallas area, she ran into a problem: her 2016 Ford F-150 wouldn’t fit in the garage. Undeterred, she bought the 2019 model. That one didn’t fit either.

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“It’s too high. It’s too long,” she said. Now she keeps it parked in the driveway. His next door neighbor also owns an F-150 and has just enough room in his garage.

“He can squeeze his own,” she said, but added that he was “hitting his front wall and barely clearing the door.”

Jake Fisher, director of automotive testing for Consumer Reports, said the trend was becoming a problem. “These are very difficult vehicles to maneuver” and park.

Take Tesla’s Cybertruck. The massive stainless steel electric pickup debuted at a media event last year, as CEO Elon Musk bragged that the Cybertruck would be the fiercest and most efficient pickup of the market when it arrives at the end of 2021. Commercial demand, he said. later has already exceeded expectations.

But some fans interested in the Cybertruck are worried there won’t be enough room for it.

Jim Griffin is Exhibit A. The Pennsylvania resident recently put down a $100 refundable deposit to secure his place in the Cybertruck queue. But he’s not sure he’ll go along with the purchase after reading online chatter about the vehicle’s immense size.

“They say, ‘This thing is huge and it won’t fit in your garage,'” he said. “That’s when I said, ‘Wait a second here, time out. This thing may not fit. “”

And installing the pickup in his garage is a dealbreaker.

“Nowadays there are people who buy Rams, Ford pickups that don’t fit, and they park them outside,” he said. “The difference here is that it’s an electric vehicle and…you have to plug it in. I’m not going to spend $50,000, $60,000, $70,000, $80,000 for one vehicle and having to run an extension cord outside the garage or an exterior exit.”

After a Tesla blogger posted a video simulation showing the Cybertruck might not fit in some garages, Musk tweeted that the company was considering some adjustments in response to concerns.

“We can probably reduce the width by an inch and maybe reduce the length by more than 6 inches without losing utility or aesthetics,” he said.

Tesla engineers are also fitting the Cybertruck with air suspension, he said. This would allow owners to lower the height of the vehicle to fit it into a garage.

“If you look like a Suburban or a Ford Expedition these days, they’re huge and I’m not sure they would fit,” Griffin said. “I even watched one once and I’m not so sure.”

“The next-gen Suburban is going to be so big — my wife drives one — you won’t be able to park it in the garage,” said Jeff Dyke, president of Sonic Automotive, one of the largest auto dealership networks in the United States. United States “The Tahoe is the new Suburban, and the new Suburban is a school bus.”

But that’s what Americans want, he says. “Gasoline prices are low, they’re reasonable, and the country is in love with SUVs.”

As residential garages become increasingly cramped, public parking lots and public parking spaces are also feeling the effects.

“The parking spots aren’t big enough,” Sonic Automotive’s Dyke said. “The parking lots are not big enough to cope with all the cars coming out.”

Trevino, the Dallas-area resident whose F-150 won’t fit in her garage, said she personally felt the frustration associated with the size of her pickup.

“My truck is really big,” she said. “Trying to maneuver in a space really sucks. If you’re going to the mall and it’s crowded, looking for a space is a huge factor. I really have to spend time looking.”

In parking garages, this is especially problematic if they have low ceilings and tight turns.

Parking.com, the consumer brand of publicly listed parking and transportation provider SP Plus, is beginning to adjust its business to accommodate larger vehicles. The company already charges oversized fees for large SUVs and trucks in some lots, especially in New York, said Jeff Eckerling, chief growth officer of SP Plus.

He said the company may have to consider going further if vehicles continue to get bigger.

“We should look at what our rates are and what we charge for these vehicles,” he said. “If you are on surface land, we could (say) that if you park and your vehicle exceeds two spaces, we could charge you two spaces.

For SpotHero, an app that sells parking at more than 7,000 locations across the country, oversize fees are currently largely limited to New York, where about 11% of vehicles must pay extra.

Now, some New York lots are starting to charge a “super oversize” fee, which applies to truck-based SUVs and pickups, while the “oversize” fee applies to crossovers.

In the rest of the country, “parking operators could pull a page out of New York’s playbook and start charging oversized fees for larger vehicles,” said Elan Mosbacher, senior vice president of strategy and operations at SpotHero.

While larger vehicles can pose some downsides, Americans don’t seem too bothered by it on the whole, at least if the vehicles being introduced by automakers are any indication.

In fact, several recent announcements suggest that vehicles should continue to get bigger. General Motors has announced that it will relaunch the mammoth Hummer as an electric pickup truck under the GMC brand. Ford is also set to introduce a redesigned F-150 later this year, and it’s likely to be larger than the previous generation.

George Augustaitis, director of automotive industry and economic analysis at Cargurus.com, speculated that Ford might even consider bringing back the Excursion nameplate as the largest SUV in its lineup despite the fact that the Shipping has increased significantly in recent years.

“Everything is getting bigger,” he said.

“We never really know where the end will be,” said IHS analyst Brinley. “People buy what they want to use. Whatever their personal reasons, whatever their place in their lives, they’ve decided it’s worth it. It’s not critical, it’s just a fact. .”