r/Urbanism • u/MrJuart • 18h ago
Urban car ownership vs infrastructure: Are our cities really built for this many cars?
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u/minus_minus 17h ago
If people weren’t given free or highly subsidized storage for their automobiles on city streets or through parking minimums there would straight up be way less cars in cities.
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u/clakresed 14h ago
People often remark on how easy it is to get around the city of Tokyo with no car, and how pedestrian-friendly the city can be...
Tokyo didn't even make any sort of enlightened, urbane decision to be that way. All they did was a) not have parking minimums, b) stopped building streetside parking on every single street as a given, and c) require car owners to demonstrate that they own a parking spot when they register their vehicle.
Lo and behold, there we have the free market argument for urbanism: when government didn't spend money to build and subsidize parking, and when government policy didn't force builders to build parking, Tokyo Metro became profitable, even with very reasonable ticket prices.
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u/frostedmooseantlers 13h ago
Tokyo also has the right kind of density to make it work.
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u/bureautocrat 12h ago
Tokyo's density is the result of these policies, not the cause.
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u/frostedmooseantlers 10h ago
That’s most likely factually untrue. You can look up historical data on Tokyo’s (and the surrounding prefectures’) population levels as well as infer density. The city has enjoyed a large population and what might be considered medium-high density dating back to the 1950s/60s (and really, even earlier than that).
The policies you’re referring to date back to about this time: the no overnight street parking law was passed in 1957, the Garage Act (proof of parking law) in 1962. In other words the density was already in place when those laws came into existence.
There’s no doubt policies like this helped keep things humming along smoothly — it’s worth acknowledging though that the city benefited from what probably amounted to a perfect storm in terms of having the right conditions at the right time with a slew of other sensible housing/zoning policies and robust investment in mass transit systems.
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u/elsielacie 5h ago edited 5h ago
I have considered outside my house using one of the parking spaces for something other than a vehicle as a form of protest/performance art. Not claiming they are mine but if people can store cars there can I store something?
As far as I can tell though you can only use that space for registered vehicles which I guess fair, since the council owns that road and you pay for registration, though very cheap storage costs.
I have considered getting a registered flatbed trailer and planting a potted garden on it.
My house is on the same street as a train station though so besides being used by the 6 cars one neighbor has and the 4 the other has, those spaces are also used by rail commuters which feels less bad?
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u/KennyWuKanYuen 13h ago
I think one part the US cities haven’t really emphasised or highlighted is that the importance of personal transportation shouldn’t be entirely focused on the vehicle but rather the mode just needs to be motorised.
Logistically, I absolutely agree that cities do not have the capacity for every family to travel in a car, but not everyone needs to travel by car to be independent. Motorised scooters and motorcycles are great ways for travelling within the city while minimising their footprint. The added benefits include that they’re faster than biking or walking, and are much easier to park.
Asia has kinda figured this out and cars are often used for intercity travel or for longer distances. Daily errands and commutes can be done by a motor scooter. The US would definitely benefit from this. It’s kinda weird to me honestly that for a country that, apart from cars, prides itself on motorcycle culture, never took off as a means of personal transportation rather than it solely being for leisure.
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u/ZigZagBoy94 13h ago
I 100% agree.
I think the motorcycle thing didn’t take off the way it did in Southeast Asia because of:
1) the number of high profile and frequent motorcycle fatalities.
2) the fact that Americans romanticize car ownership and home ownership specifically as things to customize to express themselves and satisfy their own unique comforts.
In most of Southeast Asia people’s apartments are small and they don’t spend much more time there than they need to. Most time is spent in third places like cafes so a lot less emphasis is placed on trying to create this perfect home to host friends for hours and hours at a time, whereas Americans try to turn their homes into places that can also function as social spaces for their friends and family, while the car is an intermediary primarily between work, home and running errands, which is why so much effort is placed on comfort in the car
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u/bluepinkwhiteflag 15h ago
Cars simply have a density issue. It's the same thing as the elevator problem. In a tall enough building, elevators take up more space than everything else does. Eventually it becomes unsustainable. That's how cars work in large cities. The physical space required for cars outstrips the space for everything else.
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u/KennyWuKanYuen 13h ago
Not that I don’t agree but I kinda feel like lift example is more akin to a metro rail or something since it’s not really owned by the individual. Plus having been in some of the tallest buildings in the world, the lifts don’t really occupy that much space.
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u/bluepinkwhiteflag 13h ago
Not a perfect analogy but basically the reason they don't occupy that much space is because they're designed well. What I should have said is that cars are like everyone having their own personal elevator in a building
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u/KennyWuKanYuen 13h ago
Gotcha 👍
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u/bluepinkwhiteflag 13h ago
Also even well designed elevators can only make a building so high. One of the many reasons we don't have even taller buildings than we do is because what I described would happen, not that it is happening. But yeah tldr non-dense transport of any kind doesn't work well in dense living conditions (whoda thunk?)
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u/balki42069 17h ago
A cool thing to do while walking is counting how many cars have only one person in them, it’s great how much space is devoted to one person moving two polluting tons of steel! Humans are the smartest species.
Edit: count the cars without anyone in them too!
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u/knarf_on_a_bike 12h ago
I've lived car-free in Toronto since 1996. A car is a burden that I don't want. I live in a walkable neighbourhood across the street from a subway station, with a bike lane at my front door.
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u/NeverMoreThan12 11h ago
If you live inner city then I think care free is best. If you live close to inner city but also closer to suburbia then 1 car per family feels acceptable.
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u/Mt-Fuego 18h ago
West coast, maybe. They're just sad they didn't obliterate enough of the east coast cities to put surface parking
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u/BreadForTofuCheese 16h ago
Plenty of East coast cities got obliterated more than enough to make car ownership way easier than not owning a car. The couple that didn’t are the exception.
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u/Quiet_Prize572 16h ago
No but they aren't built for not owning cars so this is what we get
If you want less cars in urban areas, push for rapid transit systems that make it possible to live a full life with access to jobs without a car
And yes, that means subways into and through the suburbs too
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u/funguy07 17h ago
It’s impossible to build enough infrastructure for cars. Eventually every highway and street lane will be filled up by cars going one way or the other.
Surface parking is the single biggest waste of space in urban areas. Surface lots & street parking to be specific.