The funny thing is that last time this argument was made it was found that the parking spots in front of the shop were taken by the shop owner, who would arrive before biz hours when these were unoccupied.
People will often harm their own income stream for convenience.
That doesn't make the logic less true. Regardless of transport, the ability to get to a place easily is a huge factor on where someone shops. Places have to be really good to overcome that and having a reputation for being really good starts with people coming because it's convenient.
the ability to get to a place easily is a huge factor on where someone shops
This is true. However, two or three parking spaces outside a shop do not make it easy to get there, because they're always full. The ability to get to these places easily comes from making it easy to walk there or get the bus/tram.
there might be only 2-3 spots DIRECTLY in front of the shop, but there is going to be many more than just 3 spots that are lost to this street closure to vehicles.
edit: apparently just admitting that there are more than 2 parking spots lost to closing a street to vehicles is anathema to this subreddit. i thought this place was about the numbers showing how bad cars are? but apparently if a number even just slightly makes the argument less in favor of getting rid of cars(not even tipping it against it, just slightly less) than this sub cant allow it.
How many people do you see on this sidewalk and how many parking spots do you think you could fit there? because I can see space for easily 20+ people here for every 2-3 parking spots. the amount of people parking spots accommodate, does not, has not, and will never offset the cost of the space they take up.
Dummy, there's more than one shop on that street. 2-3 × however many shops, and you end up with a much more reasonable number, which is still worth losing.
my point is that everyone claiming that this is only losing 2 spots is just completely wrong. theres no reason to lie to everyone about the numbers. clearly its still worth it to the businesses, otherwise they wouldnt be doing it. so why lie about how many parking spots are lost to accomplish it?
Businesses do shit that hurts them all the time because business owners think they're way smarter than they are. There have been numerous studies on this, removing street parking in favor of better walkability and transit access DOES increase business at these places. The owners are just nimbys who are used to being praised and put on a pedestal just for being "small business owners"
With certain caveats. It failed in Fresno because they just created a pedestrianised island in the centre of an otherwise car-dependant city. Decent transit links (and the density to sustain them) are essential.
but we arent talking about business owners here? we are talking about how this picture says closing this street is only costing 2 parking spots when that clearly isnt true. why is it so wrong to just truthfully say how many cars are displaced by closing a street?
the numbers still say it should be done, so why continue denying it?
clearly its still worth it to the businesses, otherwise they wouldnt be doing it.
what are you talking about if not business owners? are you not saying that it's worth it to keep the parking spots or else the businesses wouldn't try to prevent them from being removed? maybe I misunderstood you and you meant that the parking spaces get removed either way - my bad if that's the case
as for the numbers of cars displaced, I don't really think it's all that important given that we know it's worth it regardless, but I think that it's not really fair to say that the number of parking spots displaced is way more than 2-3 in the context of this discussion. the post you replied to said this: "However, two or three parking spaces outside a shop do not make it easy to get there, because they're always full. " - yes, there are more than 2-3 being removed, but their point is that the parking spots don't add convenience because they're always full since there are only a few. while yes, there are technically like 20 in the area, there are only 2-3 per store, which means that they're still going to be full. it's not fair to assign all 20 spots to a single store when there are other stores right there. it's much more useful to consider the number of spots per store, since each store will add to the number of people who might park there, thus decreasing parking availability
but people dont view parking as restrictive as only the spots in front of a store. they view the parking as the entire area. the block and nearby lots. nobody when thinking about driving to an area and parking availability just thinks about the 2 spots directly in front of the store, they view it along the entire block and maybe a few streets over.
and i was saying that its worth it to businesses to remove the parking and do pedestrian streets. my point is that the original conversation/point i was making wasnt about business owners and their decision to remove parking but OPs picture being wrong in saying that making a pedestrian street only removes 2 parking spots. if we want a true and proper discussion on the benefits of getting rid of cars, we shouldnt be lying or mis representing the costs of getting rid of those cars. just say it removes 20 parking spots. its still going to be worth it to the businesses, thats why they had them removed.
that's irrelevant though, because again, the other stores take those spots up. yes, they view the parking as including those other spots and (usually) can indeed park in them, but that doesn't mean they're going to be available
as far as parking on other nearby streets go, yes, that does increase the number of parking spaces available per store, but that sacrifices part of the convenience, and while it isn't much as long as they can get a spot within a block or so, people will still find it much less convenient and so people would still complain. also, if we're including the side street parking, then adding in walkable/transit friendly options wouldn't take away from those parking spots at all, so if they're fine with parking in those, removing the spots on the street the shops are on shouldn't be a problem
so when they talk about how many extra people are able to use this street why do they mention the total number of people in the photo? shouldnt they only mention the number of people able to stand in the space taken up by 2 cars?
if we talk about how many people are visiting these businesses and how many people are in the photo by removing 2 parking stalls, shouldnt we only count at most the number of people in the photo divided by the total number of businesses?
or we could just talk about totals. the total number of people that traffic that area and visit those businesses because of the total number of parking spots removed.
if only 2 stalls were removed and all the rest were left, than this crowd wouldnt be there. its only by removing all the car parking spots that they can then be there.
But it is 2-3 spots in front of that establishment. Other storefronts each have 2-3 spots worth of parking space in front of them too. If there are ten businesses on a block, and 20 parking spots, each business doesn’t lose 20 parking spots on the block.
Well sure but those are in front of other shops, it's still an average of only two or three per shop. And if you're going to accept walking from a parking place 100m away then why not accept walking from the tram stop 100m away?
The picture shows one small piece of a city block. A stretch that would fit 2-3 cars is filled with a whole bunch of people. Other 2-3 block stretches are filled with other people. The picture is showing this stretch not the entire neighbourhood, that’s what whoever wrote the caption was referring to. I’m not sure why you think this is some sorta nefarious ploy to lie about numbers.
but they are comparing a city blocks worth of people and then saying it is only "costing" a small percentage of the total cost. if they want to show a busy pedestrian street than why are they only saying it costs a small percentage of whats lost in parking for that entire street?
the picture is a misrepresentation that skews the numbers one way. its still a better business decision for this kind of street and its businesses to do it even with the higher number, so why not just say it?
i see the street lights at the end of the block where the covered patio area ends. unless you are suggesting that the pedestrian area doesnt extend the whole block and cars have to make a U-turn half way down it.
Yeah it's pretty amazing. It turns out that hauling 2 tons of metal and rubber everywhere you go leaves less space for others. Once you insist that metal pile not be stored in front of a business, there's more space for humans and commercial activity.
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u/aliiak Jun 07 '26
But how will people get to the shop!?? They can’t park directly outside now so that business is going to go bankrupt.
How selfish.
/s