I’ve already blogged about the gigantic scam that is parking enforcement in San Francisco. There is a sub-scam at work for people who live in certain neighborhoods: the residential parking permit system. It’s intended to make parking more sensible for people who live in high-density neighborhoods, and it may very well serve that purpose, but it’s also a huge scam intended to generate revenue for the city from fees and parking tickets.
As a thought exercise, do a web search on Residential Parking Permits on sfgov.org. Notice how all the pages pertaining to this topic on sfgov.org return 404 not found. (I’m assuming these pages were moved around recently, since both Yahoo and Google’s indexes have pointers to dead pages.) But notice, too, how sfgov.org’s own search function doesn’t find any mention of this mysterious residential parking permit on their site. It’s almost as if they don’t actually want you to apply for a permit.
When, after a half hour of searching, you eventually find the link to download the form (which, by the way, you can find here), you may rejoice as you discover that the cost of a residential parking permit is a whopping $60 per year — $10 more than the average parking ticket.
There are several goals of San Francisco’s residential parking program, according to the parking authority’s web site. They are stated thusly:
- Promote the safety, health and welfare of all San Francisco residents
by reducing unnecessary personal motor vehicle travel, noise and
pollution - Promoting improvements in air quality, convenience
and attractiveness of urban residential living - Increased use of
public mass transit - The program’s main goal is to provide more parking
spaces for residents by discouraging long-term parking by people who do
not live in the area
I’m not beneath a little old-fashioned social engineering, but sweet jumping Moses. Having a residential sticker (or not) has not reduced my driving one bit. It has never done anything to encourage me to take public transit. It doesn’t prevent me from parking in the neighborhood.
The program probably does increase the number of parking spaces in our neighborhood a little bit. But the primary motivation for someone who doesn’t live in our neighborhood to park in front of our house would be to get closer to the BART station three blocks away. Instead, because of residential permit parking, people who live a mile away from BART are likely just going to drive to work, defeating 100% of the goals of the program, at least as they apply to our area.
There’s an unstated goal behind the program, of course, which is for the city to capture more revenue, by ticketing cars that don’t have residential stickers as well as collecting that $60 a year just so people can park in front of their houses.
Ultimately, if being able to park in your own neighborhood was really the primary objective here, then they’d make the stickers cost nothing (which would be workable since you have to provide all kinds of proof that you live in the neighborhood before you can get a sticker).
Sorry for another municipal rant. I must be getting old. If I had a front lawn, I’d probably be out there right now, hiking up my pants and yelling at the neighborhood kids to stay off my property.
Update: It looks like sfgov.com still has the map of the residential parking permit up; it’s here (PDF).
I agree 100% – Thanks for the link to the PDF… It was nearly impossible for me to find it on their site.
Wow, I just moved to the Mission (25th and Shotwell) and parking is TOUGH! Because the block directly in front of my building (which is always full of cars) does not require a permit I can’t get one for the rest of the neighborhood. Any suggestions? I often come home form work late at night needing a place to park. THANKS!
Jess, my pal Hoover lives 2 blocks from you and he says “yeah it’s a bitch”. He says he rents a parking space in the nabe ($400/mo).
what’s wrong with the city generating revenue through parking permits? the state totally underfunds the city and the city has to get it from somewhere. and you’re right–$60 isn’t going to get you out of your car. they need to hike the fee to $600 to make people think twice about having a car in SF.
Oh, the “cars are evil” argument. Swell.
Our family is comprised of two parents (both of whom work) and two kids. We live at the top of a pretty steep hill, and last time I checked, no buses run on our street. Ever tried to take two kids anywhere on public transit in the rain while carrying stuff? Public transit is an option for us in some cases, but we still need a car in this city. The parking tax could be six thousand dollars a year and it still wouldn’t discourage us (well, it would probably encourage us to move away).
To answer your question, what’s wrong with generating revenue through parking permits? I’ll tell you what. Having to pay to park in front of your own house, for starters. I have a problem with the way that the city soaks its residents with regressive fees. This city is expensive enough to live in as it is, and we’ve seen way too many friends move out of the city because of the high cost of living here.
Jeffrey, do you have any idea how valuable that land that you park your car on is? Since you seem to be someone who would be all about the “free market”, would you be willing to pay market rate for that spot? Remember, you don’t own the street, the city does, even if it is in front of your house.
That’s what I would recommend for the city. Market-rate neighborhood parking permits. If no one wants to pay much for the spots in your neighborhood, they would go for $1. However, a spot in the Mission or Haight would be hundreds of dollars a month (likely at least).
See, that’s where I have a problem. Why shouldn’t the city be able to charge for land that it owns and has to maintain? I know you’ll label me as a “Cars are evil” guy, but I don’t have a problem with cars. I do have a problem with the attitude that cars come above everything else and deserve “free” spots to be left in. If I don’t have a car, can I park a storage bin in the parking spot in front of my house and leave it there for free? Is that too much to ask?
There are only parking meters in front of businesses because different people park in them all the time. Hence, parking permits would not make sense – you want to encourage turnover and easy parking for customers.
For residential areas, it makes sense to have a permit rather than something meant to encourage turnover.
Also, the job of the city is not to ensure that people have as many parking spaces as they want (in spite of what you say, not everyone needs a parking spot) Why should the city be spending millions of dollars on upkeep for areas of the street that are only available to be used by households that own a car and not expecting those people, and those people only to help pay for this storage service?
More than 30% of San Francisco households don’t own cars – so please don’t try to frame this cost as some kind of “social justice” issue. Source – http://www.livablecity.org/campaigns/c3.html#_ftnref4
My complaint is this – if I want to use the spot on the street in front of my house to grow vegetables, I can’t. Yet somehow, many people believe that it is the “duty” of the city to provide free storage space for a huge chunk of metal. There are costs associated with using that space for storage – and non-car owning households should not be subsidizing a parking spot for those that do decide to own one. That IS a social justice issue.
You’re assigning a laissez faire aspect to my argument where none exists, pal. I just want to be able to park in front of my house without paying anybody to do it. I don’t think that’s too much to ask.
Agreed that public transit needs to be better – and what better way to fund that than through parking passes that are market-priced? The neighborhoods where permits would cost the most already HAVE better transit than other areas – the Mission especially. Places like your neighborhood probably wouldn’t cost much to be a permit in, but could have transit upgraded with the money generated in other neighborhoods.
And again, I’m not saying that we need to eliminate a place to put cars, and I agree that we have to accommodate them – but why do carless people have to subsidize free parking for those that do own cars?
It’s entirely an American idea that somehow free parking is a “right”. We like to be trendsetters for the rest of the country. You want and need a car? Great! Now pay for operating it AND storing it.
The city doesn’t sell parking spaces in the way that you propose because the city is not a landlord — its job is not to make as much money as it can, its job in this case is to make sure that there are parking spaces for people who need them.
Why do you think there are only parking meters in front of businesses?
Permit parking is meant to encourage turnover — for people who don’t have permits. My original point was that it makes no sense to charge people money to get a permit so they can park on their own streets.
If the city didn’t care about making parking available then they wouldn’t have parking permits or meters.
You seem to be putting forth a vision of a carless city, which is totally valid — I wish I could run my business and manage my family in SF without a car. We’d need an order of magnitude improvement in public transit in the city before it could happen.
Until we get there, people without cars and people with cars all need to be accommodated. As a matter of public policy, any city that permits cars has to concern itself with where people are going to put them.
the problem here in Santa Barbara is that even if you have a permit and park legally they still give you a ticket and then the egos in the office say they don’t believe you’re telling them the truth when you go in to challenge it. I’m going on a dozen wrong tickets in less than 2 years.