Parklets: A New Urban Trend

[M II A II R II K]

Vancouver tax hike drives home message that cars have no place downtown


Jan. 06, 2012

By FRANCES BULA

Read More: http://m.theglobeandmail.com/news/na...service=mobile

Vancouver’s battle against the car downtown has been so successful that parking lots saw sharp declines in use last year. Thanks to a 35-per-cent tax hike on parking, the seductive appeal of the Canada Line, and a mantra that cars are bad and any other form of locomotion is good, the city’s parking corporation, EasyPark, saw a 9-per-cent drop in lot use. Private companies also saw declines, though not as steep. And although the city’s on-street parking revenue increased in 2011 by $2-million from the previous year, it fell short of projections. The final tally for 2011 was $38-million from on-street parking, instead of the $42-million projected, despite an additional 750 meters put in last year.

- Now, the managers of the city-owned downtown lots are trying to figure out what else they might do with their increasing number of empty spaces – everything from mini-storage to roof gardens. And that’s all good, says the city’s transportation director, Jerry Dobrovolny. “By 2020, we’re aiming to have less than half of the trips downtown by car,” said Mr. Dobrovolny, who oversees a system where only about 60 per cent of people travel downtown in a private vehicle – already an unusually low number for a North American city.

- Parking companies were also hit in 2011 with new taxes from two sources – a 21-per-cent increase from TransLink, and a 12-per-cent HST tax that was applied to the TransLink tax as well as the base price. “That had a dramatic affect on parking,” Mr. Poirier said. He also blamed new bike lanes for the drop. All the changes are prompting Mr. Dobrovolny to wonder if the city can reduce even more of its requirements for parking in new buildings constructed downtown, if the pattern continues.

- The city capped the number of public downtown parking spaces in 1997 at 35,000, in order to drive home the message that Vancouver was not going to do any more to accommodate cars. Since then, the city has seen the number of car trips into downtown decline steadily, even though the number of overall trips has increased as more people work and live downtown. That’s in stark contrast to almost every other North American city. In Toronto, the city parking managers aren’t seeing any drop in demand for parking. “We’re not experiencing that in Toronto,” said a somewhat bemused Gwyn Thomas, president of the Toronto Parking Authority, when told about the Vancouver situation.

.....

[M II A II R II K]

Chinatown Businesses Thrive During a Week Without Car Parking


January 24, 2012

By Aaron Bialick

Read More: http://sf.streetsblog.org/2012/01/24...t-car-parking/

.....

The myth of the urban driving shoppers was debunked again over the past week or so, when community leaders in Chinatown repurposed parking lanes on the most crowded blocks of Stockton to make more room for merchants and shoppers during the busy Lunar New Year season. If the still-overcrowded sidewalks were any indication, the parking didn’t seem to be missed. “If anything, we’ve benefited from it,” said Brian Kan of Pacific Seafood Trading Company, who was selling groceries from a stand off the curb like many other merchants. “We think it’s brought us a lot of business, actually, instead of losing business. And it’s a great way for us to interact with the people walking around, too.”

- While giving public parking spaces to private businesses may not necessarily achieve the same goals sought by public space expansions like parklets and plazas, the experiment highlighted the competing demands for street space in the densest neighborhood west of the Mississippi. In Chinatown, a disproportionate amount of real estate is devoted to moving and storing cars despite having the city’s lowest car ownership rate of 17 percent. According to a Department of Public Works press release, a study by the SFMTA estimated the corridor sees about 2,000 pedestrians per hour — and that’s on an average day.

- Cindy Wu of the Chinatown Community Development Center said that drawing shoppers to linger on already congested sidewalks didn’t necessarily help the crowding problem, but she believes the street needs some changes. She wants to explore how to allocate more space on Stockton for merchants and pedestrians in a way that is most beneficial to the neighborhood. “There are so many competing uses of the street, and parking plays a role in that,” said Wu, “but we need to figure out, for however many feet from storefront to storefront — Stockton Street is wide — what is the use that benefits the most people at one time, or what is the right balance of use?”

.....

[fflint]

New parklet on Noriega in the Sunset District:


http://oceanbeachbulletin.com/ob-pic...e-day/?pid=931

[M II A II R II K]

SF parklets a homegrown effort


July 9, 2012

By John King

Read More: http://www.sfgate.com/default/articl...rt-3692205.php

San Francisco's 2-year-old parklet effort, where parking spaces are reborn as miniature public plazas, has attracted media attention and been emulated in cities from Adelaide, Australia, to Philadelphia. But as eight volunteers on Saturday shoveled dirt from a downtown sidewalk into a low-slung frame of angled wood and steel, another aspect of parklets was on display: They're summoned into existence not from the top down, but the bottom up.

- "We'll put in grass seeds after we finish with painting," said Luke Stewart, who lives above Farm:Table cafe, sponsor of the parklet being installed outside the cafe at 754 Post St. "It's almost like working on an art project rather than building a front deck." The 35-foot-long, 6-foot-deep space is among the most ambitious of the 31 parklets that have been installed since the first platform with seating replaced a pair of parking spaces on Divisadero Street in March 2010. The outer walls are steel; the interior's cedar surface slides and twists in eye-catching patterns that also form planter edges and seating.

- Some early parklets were criticized for being little more than glorified cafe seating; others attracted indigents during the day and revelers at night. There's a need to make the spaces accessible to wheelchair users, but also a desire to encourage designs that offer attractions beyond bare platforms with metal railings and a row of tables and chairs. Yet there's no denying the success of the program, which allows two parking spaces to be converted into an accessible public space. Each parklet is sponsored by a business or community group, which pays for the construction and maintenance.

- According to the city's Planning Department, 31 parklets have been installed or are under construction. Another 15 are going through the permit process - which includes stops at the Department of Public Works and the Municipal Transportation Authority - and 18 are having their designs reviewed. A parklet on California Street near Fillmore Street has sleek LED lighting at night, while one on Mission Street in the Excelsior is adorned with painted wooden cutouts done by high school students. At the parklet outside Devil's Teeth Baking Co. on Noriega Street, three blocks from Ocean Beach, sand-colored bunch grass swirls in the Pacific breeze.

- Planners now are pondering how to change parklets from isolated spaces - urbane nooks and crannies, so to speak - into something more systematic. Several could be concentrated on a single block, for instance, or a half dozen could map a path through a neighborhood. "Any proposal to do something in the street was met with such resistance" before the parklets experiment began, said David Alumbaugh, director of the Planning Department's city design group. "Now they're popular, and it's 'Why not do more?' " At the same time, the parklet emerging on Post Street shows the importance of having local residents bring a space to life, rather than simply providing input to city planners.

.....

Neighbors, friends and volunteers, shovel dirt into the planters, to help put the finishing touches on the newly installed parklet in front of Farm:Table Restaurant on Post St. near Jones, on Saturday July 7, 2012, in San Francisco, Calif. Farm:Table Restaurant, used kickstarter to raise money to construct a parklet on the street in front of the business. Photo: Michael Macor, The Chronicle / SF

[BevoLJ]

I love the idea, but the one in the last post does not look very comfortable at all. lol.

A small urban grocery story that operates a few little stores in downtown Austin is doing something like this. Congress Ave downtown has parking spots along it and they are turning them into little areas with tables and chairs where people can sit and eat or just do whatever.

Another thing they are trying is to lease parking spaces on pedestrian heavy streets to little retailers to use. Here is a little story on it from last March.

City may consider turning parking spots into shops
By Marty Toohey
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Updated: 9:28 p.m. Sunday, March 18, 2012
Published: 8:17 p.m. Sunday, March 18, 2012

Austin City Council Members Chris Riley and Sheryl Cole, looking to invigorate the Congress Avenue street scene à la New York and San Francisco, say some businesses should be allowed to set up shop in city parking spaces.

Under a proposal from the pair, businesses along busy streets such as Congress Avenue would be able to lease spots from the city and use them for sidewalk cafes or retail activity. The proposal would essentially expand the city's practice of allowing businesses to lease sidewalk space for cafes. Riley said the goal is to create more vibrant, interesting places for pedestrians and bicyclists.

The City Council will vote Thursday on whether to instruct City Manager Marc Ott to create a test program. The program would probably be limited to one Congress Avenue business, Royal Blue Grocery, which has expressed an interest in using nearby parking spots, but it could expand should it prove successful.

The owner of Royal Blue Grocery could not be reached to comment.

...



...

Read More: http://www.statesman.com/news/local/...s-2246279.html

[tech12]

Originally Posted by fflint

If the elite motoring minority.

Since when is your average driver in SF "elite"? And since when are drivers in SF a minority group?

Look, you even proved that it's not the case in another post of yours in this thread:

Originally Posted by fflint

Are you part of the motoring minority?

San Franciscans' means of transportation to work, from the 2010 ACS via the SFMTA (pdf)

Drive alone: 36%
Carpool: 7.9%
Public transit: 34.1%
Taxicab, motorcycle, other: 2.4%
Bicycle: 3.5%
Walk: 9.4%
Work at home: 6.7%

Most San Franciscans do not drive to work. Almost nobody here drives to school, to shop, dine, bar hop, etc. Whereas motorists are a majority in most all US cities, in San Francisco motorists are a minority.

The largest single mode of transportation SF residents take to get to work is the car. How exactly does that make car drivers a minority? And those stats of course don't take into account that many (even the majority, I'd guess) people who ride public transit/walk/bike to work in SF also have cars.

I'm all for less car dependence, more biking, walking, and public transit, more parklets, etc, but I also haven't deluded myself into thinking that motorists in SF are some kind of elite minority...seriously, what the hell.

[Ch.G, Ch.G]

Originally Posted by tech12

The largest single mode of transportation SF residents take to get to work is the car. How exactly does that make car drivers a minority?

Forty-four percent of SF residents drive, either alone or together. Fifty-six percent of SF residents are non-drivers. Ergo, drivers are in the minority compared to non-drivers.

[tech12]

Originally Posted by Ch.G, Ch.G

Forty-four percent of SF residents drive, either alone or together. Fifty-six percent of SF residents are non-drivers. Ergo, drivers are in the minority compared to non-drivers.

Source?

the 2006-2010 american community survey has the following numbers for commuters in SF:

drive alone or carpooled: 46.1%
public transit: 32.6%
walk: 9.8%
bike: 3.0%
motorcycle: 0.9%
other: 0.8%
work at home: 6.0%

source: http://www.bayareacensus.ca.gov/coun...iscoCounty.htm

And once again, that does not take into account people who do not drive to work but still have vehicles that they use at other times. There were 461,797 motor vehicles registered in San Francisco, as of 2008...yet there are 372,560 housing units in SF. So that's an average of more than one vehicle per housing unit. Does that sound like a city where motorists are an elite minority?

more stats:

"in a survey of 4.5 million people who stayed in SF hotels, 25.9% engaged "a rental car in San Francisco"

Even more motorists!

and:

"only 28.5% of city families own no car at all, with an overall average of 1.10 vehicles per household in the city"

source: http://district5diary.blogspot.com/2...-all-your.html and http://www.dmv.ca.gov/about/profile/..._by_county.pdf

Even if motorists are a minority (44%-47% isn't much of one by the way, and they're STILL the largest single commuter group...and like I said, that's just in regards to commuting), it's still pretty dumb to call them all "elite". Some of the poorest people in SF have cars. How elite of them. The majority of lower and middle class people I know have cars, and/or often carpool with others who have them. How elite of them.

As someone who has spent most of my life in SF, but who has also travelled to quite a few other places (so i do have some perspective), the claim that motorists in SF are an elite minority just sent giant bullshit signals through my head. And stats seem to prove that it's BS. Flint makes it sound like the vast majority of SF residents do not ever drive or utilize motor vehicles in some way, and are being oppressed by the evil wealthy motorists or some shit.

[Ch.G, Ch.G]

Originally Posted by tech12

Source?

...some basic addition from the portion of fflint's post that you highlighted.

[Doady]

Just because a person doesn't drive to work doesn't make them a "non-driver".

[pdxtex]

this is a cool concept but in portland, i just imagine a gang of gutter punks taking over one and setting up shop in front of the food carts.. oh wait, that already happened!!

[tech12]

Originally Posted by Doady

Just because a person doesn't drive to work doesn't make them a "non-driver".

Exactly.

[fflint]

It is an incontrovertable fact, backed by all statistical analyses, that a minority of San Franciscans commute by car and the majority of San Franciscans commute by some other means than a car. In fact, between 2000 and 2010, the percentage of San Franciscans who commute by car--alone and in carpools--fell 7.4%. And those who complete non-commute trips by private automobile--to and from the corner store, school, the doctor's office, the museum--form an even smaller minority.

Yet the motorist-minority is not only granted all travel lanes, and two full lanes of public pavement per road upon which they alone may store their bulky private property for little or no cost, but they also routinely and illegally hinder other modes of transporation by closing lanes legally reserved for buses and bikes--and even crosswalks and sidewalks. 99% just isn't enough for the privileged, pampered motorist-minority. Their dominant share of public rights of way, by legal and illegal means, so far exceeds their numbers that they are an elite minority, indeed.

Parklets are not controversial among San Franciscans--they're incredibly popular. I look forward to one, two, a thousand more parklets!

[M II A II R II K]

Chicago's first two parklets, called "people spots," open in Lakeview and Andersonville.


08.03.2012

By Steven Vance

Read More: http://archpaper.com/news/articles.asp?id=6195

.....

The Lakeview parklet will be installed in front of Heritage Bicycle & General Store in formerly metered parking spaces on Lincoln Avenue. The Andersonville parklet will be installed at the end of Farragut Avenue at its intersection with Clark Street. The architects behind each project revealed their considerations and motivations in crafting the parklets.

- While the door to Heritage is a few feet away, Toukoumodis has designed chaise lounges into the space that can remain useful after businesses close for the day. The design also calls for metal stools with solar-powered lighting shining downward after dusk. Matt Nardella of Moss Design explained that the parklet’s location was chosen in part because of its distance from food retail “so people don’t feel obligated to purchase from them.” Another factor was that swapping metered parking spaces didn’t play a significant role. Speaking more about who owns the space, Nardella described that his firm tried to create a space that felt more like a park—with trees, a small lawn, and an herb garden—than a plaza, so there’s less of a sense that an entity owns the parklet.

- The process to getting two parklets in Chicago grew organically. In the case of Lakeview, Toukoumidis saw the positive impacts of parklets in San Francisco and New York City and approached the Heritage Store’s owner prior to opening. Andersonville Chamber of Commerce was approached by staff from the transportation department; the Chamber then contacted Moss Design for assistance because of their experience in building temporary parklets for Park(ing) Day, the international event that helped popularize converting parking spaces into public space. Perhaps the organizers will agree to host grand opening parties simultaneously.

.....

[mhays]

Those SF driving stats are about commuting. It's fair to assume that a lot of people who don't work, including kids and old people, aren't drivers. If you're talking about "SF residents" they would have to be included.

Transportation planners often forget those major constituencies.

[JDRCRASH]

Wow this trend really is spreading like wildfire!

[hauntedheadnc]

Originally Posted by JDRCRASH

Wow this trend really is spreading like wildfire!

Indeed. It's even spread to my small city. Read all about it.


Source.

[M II A II R II K]

Parking space party: celebrating Chicago’s first permanent parklets

http://gridchicago.com/2012/parking-...rid+Chicago%29


The Lakeview “People Spot.”






The Andersonville parklet.

[jcchii]

I hope they're sturdy

[CityKid]

The trend has spread south to Long Beach where they have opened two parklets in the last year or so. In Long Beach, they act more as an extension of the business rather than a public gathering place, which in my opinion, is a shame. Nevertheless, they have added vibrancy to these neighborhoods. These pictures are my own.

Outside Lola's Mexican Restraunt in RetroRow:


Outside Berlin Bistro/Fingerprints in the East Village:


Another is planned for RetroRow outside Number Nine, and I heard that George's Greek Cafe in Belmont Shore was also interested in adding one on 2nd Street.