Downtown Parking Lot Maps - Page 4

mthd · #61 Posted **Jun 5, 2011, 7:15 AM**

fun exercise! i tried to use a similar zoom level to many of the above (this affects the reading quite a bit)

san francisco

there are basically none in the financial district or the retail/visitor core around union square.

in the area bounded by mission, the bay, washington, and mason, the only significant lot is for employees of the federal reserve!

projects are proposed or approved for virtually all of the significant-sized lots between the bridge/80, mission street, the bay, and third street... i'd be surprised if many of these lots are around in 10 years.

MayDay · #62 Posted **Jun 5, 2011, 1:06 PM**

Downtown Cleveland - a good portion of it, anyway.

Red shows public surface parking, blue shows parking structures (some are strictly parking, others incorporate retail, etc.)

At one point most of the public surface lots had proposals which fell through for one reason or another.

Expat · #63 Posted **Jun 5, 2011, 2:18 PM**

mthd - what city are you showing?

Mayday - Is that Cleveland?

MayDay · #64 Posted **Jun 5, 2011, 3:00 PM**

Yep, that's Cleveland.

Cirrus · #65 Posted **Jun 5, 2011, 3:45 PM**

mthd's is San Francisco.

I do wish people would make a habit of always labeling, though.

MonkeyRonin · #66 Posted **Jun 5, 2011, 3:57 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by village person

These are great! Out of curiosity, do you make these at a certain zoom level (anyone who's made more than 1 of these)?

The three I've made have all been roughly at the same scale.

mthd · #67 Posted **Jun 5, 2011, 5:11 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cirrus

mthd's is San Francisco.

I do wish people would make a habit of always labeling, though.

uh... doesn't it say "san francisco" right under it!??!?!

Expat · #68 Posted **Jun 5, 2011, 8:09 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by mthd

uh... doesn't it say "san francisco" right under it!??!?!

mthd - sorry if I missed your label! thanks for putting the map together.

BevoLJ · #69 Posted **Jun 5, 2011, 10:26 PM**

I love the maps thanks for posting these.

One thing though as some people seem to be doing different things. I think some people are not putting vacant land on their maps but the original poster is putting vacant land on his. Could those possible mention in their post if they are deviating from the OP so there might be a bit more consistency, or at least mention the differences in consistency?

Also I was thinking of doing some for London and Austin but I'm not sure on how y'all are doing garages? Some seem to be putting them some aren't. Personally I think if they are at least 4-5 stories tall they are ultimately do more good than bad by bringing people to downtowns, under that then they are wasted space. But that is just a odd way I look at things. What is the rule most others are using for their maps for garages?

J. Will · #70 Posted **Jun 5, 2011, 10:38 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by BevoLJ

I love the maps thinks for posting these.

One thing though as some people seem to be doing different things. I think some people are not putting vacant land on their maps but the original poster is putting vacant land on his. Could those possible mention in their post if they are deviating from the OP so there might be a bit more consistency, or at least mention the differences in consistency?

Also I was thinking of doing some for London and Austin but I'm not sure on how y'all are doing garages? Some seem to be putting them some aren't. Personally I think if they are at least 4-5 stories tall they are ultimately do more good than bad by bringing people to downtowns, under that then they are wasted space. But that is just a odd way I look at things. What is the rule most others are using for their maps for garages?

I would say if the garage is lined with ground-floor retail (not just one little dry cleaners on the corner, but lined with continuous retail except for the space needed for garage entrance/exit), then it shouldn't be included. If the garage has no retail, or just a couple small retail spaces in a garage that takes up half a city block, then it should be included.

This garage in Toronto's Kensington Market for example, has most of it's street frontage lined with retail. The fact that it's clad in brick also helps it look nicer than most parking garages, but that's more an aesthetic thing.

mthd · #71 Posted **Jun 5, 2011, 11:06 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by BevoLJ

I love the maps thanks for posting these.

One thing though as some people seem to be doing different things. I think some people are not putting vacant land on their maps but the original poster is putting vacant land on his. Could those possible mention in their post if they are deviating from the OP so there might be a bit more consistency, or at least mention the differences in consistency?

i'm not sure there is any vacant land in my map which isn't either a) a parking lot or b) a construction site. i would have thought any reasonably flat piece of dirt would get turned into a parking lot pretty quickly in most downtowns!

KevinFromTexas · #72 Posted **Jun 6, 2011, 3:32 AM**

I hate parking lots downtown. It makes for boring areas in my LEGO model. Although, I do like to stand there and dream about what could be. Plus, it's fun to drop in a landmark now and then.

Most of the big parking lots that are left in downtown Austin are owned by the State, and even those are planned for development. The State of Texas is wanting to develop something like 10 million square feet of space north of the Capitol with private development taking place in mostly mixed use buildings. It's fine with me, because that is one of the deadest most yuck areas of downtown.

photoLith · #73 Posted **Jun 6, 2011, 4:40 AM**

Ill go back and redue my Houston map tomorrow including all the craptastic parking garages downtown. Almost all of downtown Houston will be red, and yeah, if people keep doing these, also mark just vacant lots and land in downtown thats not a park or anything, just wasted space thats blight but has potential of being developed one day.

And yeah Kevin, the are between the capitol and the start of UT is pretty much desolate wasteland. I was going to do one for Austin, but I couldnt fit everything I wanted into it without zooming out too far. Austin still has tons of parking lots scattered around everywhere downtown, especially the area in the gay bar district kinda by the new courthouse.

Shasta · #74 Posted **Jun 6, 2011, 10:42 PM**

Photo- You're young. While it totally sucks that Houston has lots of surface parking lots and parking structures in downtown, you'd likely have killed yourself in the late 1980s. That was right after a decade of tear downs as land owners and developers cleared large lots waiting for the next big tower than never came.

However, I prefer to see the progress that Houston has made since I worked downtown in the mid 1990s. Dozens of old buildings have been restored. New public parks have been created and old ones totally revamped. Large scale projects such as the Toyota Center, Hobby Center, Minute Maid, Aquarium, Pavilions, etc... have brought life back to the city center. Light rail finally happened. Extension lines will be coming relatively soon. UH Downtown and South Texas College of Law have both expanded. The bayou area has been totally cleaned up and more is planned in the future. The first residential high rise has been built downtown since the 1960s and three more are in the pipeline. It's not all bad.

KevinFromTexas · #75 Posted **Jun 6, 2011, 11:07 PM**

I'd like to see an Austin map, but I'm lazy, so does anyone else want to do it?

By the way, don't worry with including UT as it's not technically "downtown" - and besides, there's almost no parking lots anywhere near UT anyway. That's why it's the densest area of Austin.

BevoLJ · #76 Posted **Jun 6, 2011, 11:10 PM**

Ya, I'll give it a go. I was going to try it yesterday and got started on one for London but then got distracted by the "Game of Thrones" TV show and forgot to go back and finish. lol. I'll try doing one for downtown between the creeks and UT and the river.

photoLith · #77 Posted **Jun 6, 2011, 11:16 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shasta

Photo- You're young. While it totally sucks that Houston has lots of surface parking lots and parking structures in downtown, you'd likely have killed yourself in the late 1980s. That was right after a decade of tear downs as land owners and developers cleared large lots waiting for the next big tower than never came.

I may not remember the 90s and 80s for downtown Houston but I sure know of the horror that was downtown Houston during the 80s and 90s.

http://www.islandia.is/lhm/images/parking-houston.jpg

I would still like to see some of those smaller buildings that were sitting around the sea of parking lots still here today though.

MonkeyRonin · #78 Posted **Jun 6, 2011, 11:29 PM**

Vancouver. Note that many of these lots have been or are in the process of being developed, but this was the parking situation as of 2 years ago.

Shasta · #79 Posted **Jun 6, 2011, 11:34 PM**

If you looked at downtown from that very same viewpoint today, you'd see a portion of Minute Maid Park, the bars across the street, Vic and Anthony's, The Annunciation School expansion, 5 Houston Center, Hess Tower, One Park Place, Embassy Suites, Hilton Americas Hotel, the GRB Convention Center, Discovery Green Park, House of Blues/Houston Pavilions (3 full blocks), the Toyota Center, Holiday Inn Express, South Texas College of Law Library, 3 additional buildings at St Joseph's Hospital, METRO's Headquarters and Transit Center, the Co-Cathedral of the Sacred Heart, Tellepsen YMCA, 4 Houston Center + Shops at Houston Center (two full blocks), the Four Seasons Hotel and Condos and at least 7 parking garage towers which are unfortunately a necessary evil but better than a surface lot.

BevoLJ · #80 Posted **Jun 7, 2011, 12:07 AM**

Here is my horribly done one of Austin. =)

Sorry about how bad it is. I did it in MS Paint and I'm not very good at it. Here is what I put on there.. Areas that are nothing that should be something pretty much. I left off 3 or 4 garages that are over 6 levels tall and have other stuff on them that I think are good for downtowns. It does allow people who drive to come to downtown with is better than them always stay out in the burbs due to not being able to park. Also in the hills that is the west side of downtown, Austin has a crapload of little tiny homes than have been turned into Law Firms, offices for Congressmen/Lobbyist, or little software or tech type companies with like 10 or so people working there. Those little homes turned offices have like 3-4 parking spots. I didn't bother marking anything with less than 5 parking spots but if someone would like me to it would be very easy and I would be happy to do so.

My basic rules was if it was a useless lot I marked it. If it is just one small straight line or a tiny box those are usually parking lots with like 5-15 spaces. If it had more than 15 spots I marked it boxes. The couple exceptions to the last rule was the super tall big ass garages that I think are good. Although there is one big ass like 10 story garage up by UT that I marked just because it takes the whole damn block and is just ugly and annoying to me. Oh, and I did screw up and mark one parking lot on the east side of the creek. It is right between the creek and I-35 on the south end of the Frank Erwin Center. I didn't mean to mark it and don't know how to undo it. I didn't mark the ones way down south on that side of the creek as they are all flood zones and can't be developed anyhow. That is going to change with the new flood tunnels that should be finished in a couple years.

Sorry it is so bad. I'll try to make my London one a bit better.