US Cities Are Falling Out of Love With the Parking Lot

This story was first published in The Guardian.

If you laid all of them together, they would cover an area the size of Connecticut. A growing number of cities and states are refusing to force more on people because they harm communities and cause the climate crisis.

Local governments have been requiring the construction of parking lots for a long time. Cars have become the default transportation option for most Americans as a result of these measures.

In January, California will become the first US state to ban parking minimums in areas with public transportation, as well as helping alleviate global warming emissions from cars.

Several cities across the country have recently loosened or scrapped requirements for developers to build new parking lots. Gernot Wagner, a climate economist at Columbia Business School, said that parking minimums have helped kill cities.

It's an amazing step to get rid of minimums. The largest source of planet-warming emissions in the US is transportation. A major rethink is taking place which is good for cities and families.

Climate campaigner and public transportation advocates have seized upon the previously arcane issue of parking minimums, posting aerial pictures on social media demonstrating the vast swathes of prime urban land given over to parking lots and pushing city council to foster denser communities with more opportunities to walk, cycle, or catch buses and

Cities such as Buffalo, New York, and Fayetteville, Arkansas, have reduced parking minimums in the past few years and have seen a surge in activity to transform old buildings into shops, apartments, and restaurants. Many times larger than the building itself, plots for car parking were seen as un viable by developers.

A new wave of cities are trying to do the same thing. The parking change for the city's core area was proposed by a member of the Nashville Metropolitan Council.

A dental practice in Henderson's district was forced to build a parking lot for 45 cars because they only had enough space for a small group of patients.