The U.S. is home to about 2 billion parking spaces – that’s nearly seven spots for every car and enough asphalt to cover the entire state of Connecticut. Over the last century, parking spaces proliferated as cities and towns broadly mandated minimum parking requirements for new and repurposed developments. Though municipalities stubbornly clung to these strict limits for many decades, it appears that times may be changing. Cities and towns nationwide are scaling back or repealing parking requirements – and that’s welcome news for environmentalists and real estate developers.
What Are Minimum Parking Requirements?
Municipalities impose minimum parking requirements based on building size and its use, taking into account the number of people who will be parking their vehicles at the site. For instance, zoning regulations in Westport, Connecticut, require at least one parking space for every 250 square feet of professional office space; every 200 square feet of medical office space; every 180 square feet of retail space; and every 50 square feet of patron floor area in restaurants (in addition to one space for each additional 500 square feet of interior floor area). Multi-family dwelling units in Westport must have 1.75 spaces per one-bedroom unit, 2.25 spaces per two-bedroom unit and 2.50 spaces for units with three or more bedrooms.
Why Relax the Standards?
Parking policies were largely developed in the middle of the last century, during rapid suburbanization, highway construction and increasing vehicle ownership. Minimum parking standards were largely copied from municipality to municipality, but detractors have long dismissed the formulas used as arbitrary. Advocates for parking reform point to environmental, social, and financial downsides to having seas of asphalt eating up space in cities and towns. When buildings are separated by large parking lots, they argue, it encourages more driving and less walking and use of public transit. Paving parking lots can unnecessarily destroy natural landscapes, especially when many off-street parking spaces wind up unused.
Further, the valuable real estate allotted for parking spaces could be used more constructively, like for more affordable housing units, and since housing complexes require a minimum number of parking spaces per unit, developers are forced to limit the number of units to meet the parking demands. Developers bemoan that minimum parking standards constrain their projects in general; devoting valuable real estate to parking drives up their costs, which they must pass on to tenants in the form of higher rents.
With the recent meteoric growth in telecommuting in the wake of the pandemic, fewer people are driving to work each day; therefore, fewer parking spaces are needed at many buildings. The increasing popularity of ride-share services like Uber and delivery services like Instacart have further disrupted traffic patterns and put downward pressure on the need for off-street parking spaces at various locales.
Parking Reform Gains Momentum
In recent years, hundreds of cities nationwide have relaxed or repealed their parking requirements, according to The New York Times. In electing to eliminate minimum parking requirements, some municipalities have left it to developers to figure out an appropriate parking formula. The thinking is that developers are vested in seeing their developments succeed and, therefore, will want to ensure an adequate parking supply.
In our dealings with municipalities in Connecticut, we have noted more flexibility on the part of planning and zoning boards when, in particular situations, the parking requirements are overly aggressive.
Our client, ROAN Development Ventures, recently received approval for a reduction in the minimum parking requirements for The Hamlet at Saugatuck, a mixed-use development adjacent to the Westport, Connecticut, train station, lauded as one of the most significant developments in 2023, and is surrounded by commuter parking lots. Given that the development, which will include a hotel, restaurant, and retail space, is expected to be busier at night and on the weekends – when the commuter lots are generally empty – zoning officials agreed to scale back the requirement to one parking spot for every 1,300 square feet of floor area.
Another client owns two professional office buildings totaling 120,000 square feet, which are currently 80% leased, on one 20-acre property. The property includes 400 parking spaces and some natural landscape and wetland areas. Over a two-week period, we counted how many parking spaces were taken; on the busiest day, only 90 spaces were utilized.
To attract more tenants, our client is requesting a change in zoning to allow part of the building to be used for medical offices, which have higher parking minimums than office buildings and would require more parking spaces to be paved to accommodate the zoning change. During our initial conversations, zoning officials seemed open to a creative solution. After all, they don’t want to take away from the natural landscape to pave more spaces if unnecessary. Creative solutions could include the developer agreeing to a contingency plan, like providing valet parking or off-site shuttle service, in the event the 400 spaces turn out to be inadequate after the zoning change.
The Takeaway
Looking ahead, all indications are that parking reform will continue to gain momentum across the U.S. While it does not appear likely that Connecticut planning and zoning boards will significantly overhaul parking requirements anytime soon, they are becoming more willing to explore alternative solutions on a case-by-case basis.
Eric D. Bernheim, managing partner at FLB Law in Westport, Conn., represents tenants, developers, municipalities, and lenders in transactions of all kinds, including leases, acquisitions, dispositions, and financing, in addition to handling zoning and land use matters. Contact Eric at bernheim@flb.law or 203.635.2200. For more information about FLB Law, click here.
