Dr Paul Barter LKY School of Public Policy National University of Singapore paulbarter@nus.edu.

sg

Parking Policy in Asian cities highlights

Photo by Rutul Joshi

Study commissioned by ADB under RETA 6416: A Development Framework for Sustainable Urban Transport - Parking Policy in Asia: Status, Comparisons and Potential
Photo: Zaitun Kasim

1. Framework for thinking about parking policy choices

1.

Conventional approaches
parking as ancillary infrastructure for buildings, hence parking requirements

2.

Parking management approaches

parking as a tool for wider policy goals parking as a real-estate based service

3.

Market-based approaches

1. Framework for thinking about parking policy choices

Approaches to parking policy
Autocentric

What is parking?
And whose responsibility?

Central goals

Conventional
Demand-realistic

Avoid parking scarcity Infrastructure Government + property Avoid both scarcity owner responsibility. and wasteful surplus Serve wider urban & transport policy goals Infrastructure Government responsibility mainly Key goal is constraint of car travel (to certain locations) Ensure demand, supply and prices are responsive to each other

Multi-objective

Parking management
Constraint-focused

Market-based

Real-estate based service Private beneficiaries (willingness to pay)

2. Selected results: Parking requirements at commercial buildings (on average) versus approximate car ownership

2. Selected results: Exempting small buildings from requiring parking

Tokyo Taipei Bangkok Floor area threshold below which no parking requirements Yes (1500 or 2000 sq. m). Above this requirements phase in gradually Yes (300 or 500m2) Yes (commercial, office, shopping malls: 300m2; condominiums: 60m2 per unit; hotels: 30 rooms; restaurants: 300m2; entertainment buildings 500 seats) No? No? No No No No Yes (500m2) Yes (60m2) Yes? Low-rise residential buildings exempt No

Seoul Jakarta Singapore Kuala Lumpur Manila Hong Kong Guangzhou Ahmedabad Beijing Hanoi Dhaka

Source: Shoup, D.

2. Selected results: On-street pricing and time limits

Prices vary from place to place or time to time? Jakarta Kuala Lumpur Bangkok Hong Kong Manila Singapore Tokyo Taipei Seoul Dhaka Ahmedabad Hanoi Guangzhou Beijing Two zones One price per municipality Uniform where priced Uniform legislated price One price per municipality Two zones Uniform legislated price Higher where demand high Five zones Higher in CBD Uniform where priced Two zones Zones with different prices Two zones Highest price found Time limits used? (PPP$/hr) 0.37 0.41 0.60 1.46 1.71 1.90 2.58 3.45 7.86 0.78 per day 0.16 0.81 1.05 1.32 No Yes (3 hrs) No Yes (2 hrs) Yes (3 hrs) No Yes (60 min) No No No No No ? ?

2. Selected results: Where do people park?

Locations for shopping/entertainment parking by survey respondents

2. Selected results: Proportion paying for parking (as % of respondents parking for each purpose)

2. Selected results: Average work-based parking prices paid by survey respondents per month (January 2010 US$)

* In Manila, Seoul, and Ahmedabad fewer than 20 respondents paid for parking at work so their mean prices should be treated with extra caution.

2. Selected results: CBD parking prices compared with CBD Grade A office rents (on a rent per square meter basis) in many
international cities, based on Colliers International data sources

2. Selected results: other highlights

Parking enforcement best practices make a difference (e.g. freeing the police from this role) Japan's proof-of-parking policy is important Priced off-street parking (both private and public sector) outside of destination premises is most significant in Beijing, Taipei, Hanoi, Hong Kong and (apparently) Tokyo Several cities have price controls over private sector parking (Beijing, Guangzhou, Hanoi, Jakarta) Parking policy for TDM is surprisingly rare in Asia (Seoul is the main exception)

3. Parking policy trajectories in Asia

Parking requirement enthusiasts: Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok, Jakarta and Manila. South Asian cities seem headed this way. TDM cities with surprisingly conventional parking policy: Hong Kong, Seoul and Singapore (Inadvertent) Market-fostering: Tokyo
Result of 3 pragmatic policies: low parking requirements that exempt small buildings; limited on-street parking; and the proof-of-parking rule.

An intermediate path: Taipei, Beijing and Guangzhou and (perhaps) Hanoi.

4. Key policy implications

Fear of chaotic on-street parking is a key motivation for requiring parking in real estate developments BUT plentiful off-street parking provides no guarantee of orderly on-street parking Solving on-street parking problems requires on-street parking management, not necessarily off-street supply expansion. On-street parking chaos is not proof of a shortage

4. Key policy implications

Pricing is widespread in Asian cities, especially in East Asia A surprising proportion of parking is free-of-charge (or cheap) even in cities with high property prices Price controls on private-sector parking are unwise Government-subsidized parking is a highly regressive and unwise use of taxpayers resources Parking requirements seem an easy option but are problematic. Audacious to think that we can predict parking demand of buildings for decades

4. Key policy implications

Constraint-focused parking policy deserves wider application but faces political and practical barriers in many cities Multi-objective parking management has much to offer and deserves much wider application Park-once neighborhoods (most parking in shared public parking with market-prices) are already common and are highly relevant to Asian conditions. They could provide a useful focus for market-oriented parking policies.