[M II A II R II K]

DCP Advances Promising Manhattan Parking Reforms, Fixes Flawed Study


January 3, 2012

By Noah Kazis

Read More: http://www.streetsblog.org/2012/01/0...-flawed-study/

PDF Study: http://www.nyc.gov/html/dcp/pdf/mn_c...core_study.pdf

When plans to reform parking policies in the Manhattan core leaked out of the Department of City Planning last fall, the documents presented a riddle. The proposed changes were solid reforms to successful policies, closing loopholes in the existing parking caps and rationalizing the current system. The draft study which accompanied the reforms, however, seemed to play fast and loose with the facts while arguing for the city to allow parking to eat up more of Manhattan’s valuable space. One hand didn’t seem to know what the other was doing, and with New York’s powerful real estate industry lobbying against the parking maximums, parking reform was in a precarious position.

At the end of the year, though, DCP released the final version of its Manhattan core parking study. The internal conflicts seem to have been resolved, and the results are far more encouraging. The sloppy and misleading analysis is gone and the positive reforms remain. Assuming that DCP continues on its current path — and that the City Council eventually agrees — Manhattan’s precedent-setting-but-decades-old parking regulations are on track to be updated for the 21st century. Specific language for the new regulations is due in the next few months, according to DCP.

In the final version of its Manhattan core study, DCP says unequivocally that the 30-year-old system of parking maximums has been successful, an endorsement nowhere to be found in the earlier draft. “The Manhattan Core parking regulations have proved to be compatible with population and job growth and a thriving Central Business District,” the authors write. “In almost three decades since the Manhattan Core regulations were enacted, the Manhattan Core has added population and jobs and has strengthened its position as the vital heart of a world city. Travel into the CBD has shifted toward transit and away from private vehicles.” Those trends aren’t all the result of parking maximums, of course, but the regulations have helped shape the areas below West 110th Street and East 96th Street.

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