San Francisco Parking

A 71 unit apartment complex was planned to be built at Ocean and Phelan avenues, however much controvery came about. The main issue with the construction of the housing is that it only has 7 parking spaces for everyone in the whole apartment building. Additionally, only one of these spaces is reserved for handicapped people and another for car-sharing. This leaves 5 spaces for everyone else in the entire complex whether they are handicapped or not. If anyone living in the complex, say for example, an old disabled woman, cannot get one of these 7 spots to park, then she will be forced to park far away and strenuously walk to her apartment. As a result of the limited parking spots, a multitude of people are angered. In fact, 457 people signed a petition against the project and many speakers spoke with passion against it at a recent planning commission hearing. However these people are not only against this one complex, but the fact that there are numerous accounts of reducing parking spaces.The citys planning director has been trying and will continue to try to limit parking, although he sees it much differently than the people of S.F. Some planning directors see the movement of reducing parking spaces as economical and environmental, as well as decreasing the dreaded S.F. traffic. A planning director views less parking spaces as encouragement to continue driving farther in order to park, and consequently lessening traffic and congestion. Also, less parking spaces will be an incentive to take public transit instead of driving, which could lead to less fuel emissions in the air. Lastly, it encourages public transportation as a means of saving money on gas, or a car in general. However, I along with many S.F. residents disagree with the movement. I personally dont believe that having less parking spaces can actually reduce traffic, rather,it moves it farther down the road. Also, many people have the necessity to drive their own car. For example, a mother who has kids and needs to go grocery shopping. She cant bus and carry children back and forth. Also, pet owners cant take their pets on public transit. Also, the people with jobs need to arrive at work on time, and more often than not the public transportation is late. Lastly, public transit doesnt stop as often as neccessary for disabled people. But if a person with disabilites has a car they can get as close as neccessary to their destination. Therefore, I beleive that there should not be reductions in the amount of parking spaces because they are neccessary for a wide variety of people. Overall Ifeel that fewer parking spaces is a fair attempt at an economical/environmental approach, however its not very realistic because many people need cars to get where they want to be, where they need to be, and on time.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/08/02/BA2M1EMDHB.DTL