Parking Minimums as Ethnic Cleansing (Ep 1)

In which we survey the ways that some of the worst parts of municipal zoning codes were added to displace certain ethnic minorities.

Parking minimums are like icebergs in American development patterns.

They have some very visible components of their existence, but the effect they have on the world is vast. (Like the effect an iceburg had on the Titanic)

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Let us define ethnic cleansing a bit.

Ethnic Cleansing (mirriam webster)

the expulsion, imprisonment, or killing of an ethnic minority by a dominant majority in order to achieve ethnic homogeneity

Ethnic Cleansing (dictionary.com)

The organized, often violent attempt by a particular cultural or racial group to completely remove from a country or area all members of a different group

Ethnic Cleansing (encyclopedia brittanica)

the attempt to create ethnically homogeneous geographic areas through the deportation or forcible displacement of persons belonging to particular ethnic groups. Ethnic cleansing sometimes involves the removal of all physical vestiges of the targeted group through the destruction of monuments, cemeteries, and houses of worship.

I think it should be mentioned that ethnic cleansing is widely regarded by civilized people as a war crime, one of the worst things that humans can do to other humans.

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Parking minimums, in my words, is defined thusly:

In order to obtain a permit (without which you'd be violating the law) from a municipality to make a modification to an existing property OR build a new building, one needs to 'satisfy' minimum parking requirements, where one is required to provide for a certain number of automobile parking spaces based on metrics related to the size of the building in question.

The 'metric' might be the square foot of the retail area, the number of bowling alley lanes, or the number of bedrooms, and each of these metrics has a ratio of required parking space provisions. three spaces per bowling alley lane, for example, or .9 spaces per bedroom, rounded up.

If one goes to a municipality for a permit, and you don't provide evidence that the parking minimums will be satisfied, they'd laugh you out of the room and tell you to come back when you've satisfied the minimums in your plans, and if there's a backlog to the application approval process, you will be forced to wait perhaps months before getting your application re-reviewed.

To clarify, in America, you cannot build or modify a building without having a certain number of car parking spaces. Regardless of if that is a good or god-awful idea.

Such is my definition of parking minimums. An astute observer will note that most municipal codes were adapted between the 1920s and 1950s.

Here’s what parking minimums look like in modern municipal zoning codes.

It's inscrutable, yet this little table (and little tables like it) is part of why American cities are so broken.

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OK, so to call back to the title of this article, parking minimums as ethnic cleansing.

Definitionally, a ‘parking minimum’ is a piece of legislation, usually embedded in a municipalities' zoning code, that specifies a ratio between something like ‘finished building area’, and a required number of spaces.

The policy makers fully understand that parking minimums influence nearly everything about development. Here's a quote on the city of Golden:

Often times parking requirements drive potential developments, so it is important to check that the minimum parking requirements will be met.

Here’s what ethnic cleansing looks like in America:

cars.destroyed.our.cities

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Parking minimums rolls up to 'zoning regulations', which is one group of people explicitly deciding what is and is not allowed to be done in a given geography. Here's what the city of Denver says about the purpose of it's own zoning:

The Denver Zoning Code balances conservation and development to implement the community's vision for the future of Denver through our built environment.

What is the community's vision, you might ask?

Well, if you've ever been to Denver, you know the answer. "Sprawl". Sprawl is accomplished (and mandated) through things like parking minimums, though there are other harmful regimes in place as well.

I've hung out with a lot of planners, and it's funny to me that they hardly see themselves as technical experts - they seem to see themselves as mouthpieces of 'community engagement', and as very complicated survey-runners.

Anyway, we're talking about parking minimums, so first lets just see what they look like. All these quotes are pulled from current, active zoning codes that you could look through yourself. I'll leave links to sources throughout.

Most of the words about parking minimums are pure propaganda. Utterly detached from reality.

Parking requirements encoded within municipal zoning ordinances represent a powerful tool for shaping a city’s transportation and development character. The collective ability of communities to use zoning and other tools to shape local transportation conditions around shared values and goals will have increasingly far-reaching impacts.

For roughly fifty years, zoning codes across the United States have included minimum requirements for accessory (defined as on-site, tenant-reserved) parking spaces as a means of mitigating the impact of increased parking demand on nearby streets. Most of these requirements were first drafted during the middle of the twentieth century – a time when the advent of affordable, personal automobiles had captured the public imagination and shaped the vision of future urban development. The intense demand for this newly accessible transportation option generated concerns about the impacts on local streets, as residents, commuters, visitors, and shoppers competed for a limited supply of spaces.

https://www.montgomerycountymd.gov/DOT-Parking/Resources/Files/study_summary.pdf

Division 59-E-1. Off-Street Parking and Loading.

Sec. 59-E-1.1. Required.

Off-street parking spaces with adequate provisions for ingress and egress by motor vehicles shall be provided, in accordance with the provisions of this article, for any main building or structure at the time of construction and when any main building or structure is enlarged or increased in capacity. All off-street parking facilities provided, whether required or in addition to minimum requirements, shall conform to all standards contained in this article.

(Legislative History: Ord. No. 10-32, § 8.)

https://www.montgomerycountymd.gov/DOT-Parking/Resources/Files/Article59-E.pdf

The association between parking minimums and ethnic cleansing is through the lovely piece of american history known as 'urban renewal'.

Urban renewal was the legal regime by which politically powerful white people destroyed the homes of 'unwanted' ethnic groups, using excuses related to GDP as an excuse.

They would say: "Roads and cars increase GDP, we need more roads, lets demolish buildings to make roads, and we need somewhere to put all the cars, so we'll require parking to be added everywhere."

And since the rest of the world knew how to build roads without destroying existing buildings, Americans had to fabricate a scientific rational for why they were widening roads and tearing down buildings.

josh, that seems like a stretch...

Lets look at some pictures:

cars.destroyed.our.cities

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Proposition 1: Parking lots dominate the landscape of American cities.

Proposition 2: Ethnic cleansing dominates the lives and psyches of both the victims and the perpetrators.

Proposition 3: The harms of ethnic cleansing would be dramatically reduced if we could properly localize responsibility and cause and effect for the existence of 'municipal parking minimums'.

"parking minimums" were created by politically powerful white people to create space for the torrent of cars they were causing to flood into cities. To 'solve the problem' they were creating, they created another problem (parking minimums.)

It's insane to me to hear planners take the regime of parking minimums seriously. It's like believing the earth is flat, but more harmful and less excusable.

I am angry.

do you want to end ethnic cleansing in the world today? do you think anything in the world matters? Do you feel like abolishing zoning is a bit too big of a next step?

Abolish parking minimums.

If you are someone who resists abolishing parking minimums, at all, and consider yourself to be knowledgable, at all, in issues regarding 'city planning', I will mentally categorize you as a eugenicist, and one supportive of genocide, dangerous or naïve, and

Josh, how do we abolish parking minimums it's too complicated...

ChatGPT to the rescue:

Amendment to Municipal Zoning Code

Section 1. Purpose and Intent

The purpose of this amendment is to remove parking minimum requirements in the municipal zoning code. The intent of this amendment is to promote more efficient land use and development patterns, reduce automobile dependency, and encourage the use of alternative transportation modes.

Section 2. Amendments

Section X of the municipal zoning code is hereby amended to remove all references to parking minimums for all land uses, including but not limited to residential, commercial, and industrial uses.

Section 3. Severability

If any provision of this amendment or its application to any person or circumstance is held invalid, the remainder of this amendment or the application of the provision to other persons or circumstances shall not be affected.

Section 4. Effective Date

This amendment shall take effect immediately upon adoption by the municipal governing body.

Section 5. Repeal of Conflicting Ordinances

All ordinances or parts of ordinances in conflict with this amendment are hereby repealed to the extent necessary to give this amendment full force and effect.

Section 6. Publication

The municipal zoning code shall be updated to reflect this amendment, and a copy of this amendment shall be made available to the public upon request.

Section 7. Enactment

This amendment to the municipal zoning code was duly adopted by the governing body of the municipality at a regular meeting held on [insert date].

Done.