Parking makes people angry
Some days when blogging I’m counting up the predictable headlines, and here are two on a similar topic: Outremont residents angry over parking and La Chambre de commerce veut plus de places de stationnement à Montréal.
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Kate
Reply
Jonathan 10:49 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
I hear you. I attended a public consultation last week on a proposed new condo project on St Laurent and Guizot. 70 new units and… get this… 156 parking spaces. The city planner claims this is necessary to take pressure off of the on-street parking demand. I made a statement that the city needs to limit parking, not provide it. A high demand for on street parking means there are too many cars, not too little parking spaces (especially within a 10 minute walk of a metro station).
Not one voice in the consultation was for the parking spots, everybody who spoke in the debate that ensued concurred that the planning department was not in line with the environmental objectives of the city. They were also visibly not in line with the sentiment of those people in attendance.
I feel like these media outlets are the only ones angry about the lack of parking. Maybe has something to do with all the car advertisement money they receive?
Ian 11:23 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
How is a condo development including parking spaces in its building plan the same as the city providing parking spaces?
“proposed new condo project on St Laurent and Guizot. 70 new units …156 parking spaces. The city planner claims this is necessary to take pressure off of the on-street parking demand. I made a statement that the city needs to limit parking, not provide it. ”
That doesn’t even make sense. It’s not the city providing parking, it’s the developer proposing that they create their own parking – and the city planner supports this, to alleviate on-street parking.
In any case you have no idea why people might be driving, that is super close to the 40 so anyone working in VSL or the west Island or the east end that is underserved by the STM might look at that location as a perfect spot if they want to reduce commute time. I would love to have my job within walking or bicycling distance from my house, or even reliably & regularly served by the STM – but not everyone is that lucky. Try to think outside your bubble.
Kate 11:37 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
Jonathan, that’s near where I live. Are they proposing to take down that yellow brick building on the northwest side and put up a new building?
Joey 11:50 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
@Ian I think the point is that the city is insisting on this many parking spaces. Are they merely parroting the developer’s plan/justification? Sounds like it, but that’s sort of beside the point, no?
dwgs 11:52 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
If they’re doing it as underground parking I would say that it’s reasonable. I don’t see any other way to do it there since the neighbourhood is pretty dense.
Spi 12:06 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
There are general guidelines established by the city as to minimum parking spots that should be included in a development project precisely to avoid spillover on to street parking, usually, it’s 1.(something) the number of units in the whole project. PM abolished that minimum requirement in 2018 for downtown developments. This might just be an application of the rules in Villeray. But 2.x parking spots per unit is a high number.
DeWolf 12:29 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
Is there any actual data that suggests Montrealers are going to the suburbs to shop because they can’t find parking spots in the city? We hear this old chestnut repeated a lot but I’ve never seen any numbers to back it up.
Spi 12:59 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
@DeWolf anecdotally I know of people that live on the northern side of the island (north of the 40) close enough to the highway (15 or Papineau) that often going to Wal-Mart in Laval is more convenient and faster than any of the on-island locations, and because of the prevalence of the super-centre design you could combine 2-3-4 stores into one trip.
Blork 13:15 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
I agree with what @Spi said. There probably aren’t a lot of Plateau or Mile-end residents going to suburban malls, but most Montrealers do NOT live in the Plateau and Mile-end. People who live in Côte-des-Neiges, NDG, Verdun, Ville-Émard, Hampstead, Ahuntsic, St-Leonard, etc. have pretty quick access to suburban malls (if they have cars), and getting from those boroughs to downtown by car is a major PIA, and doing any kind of serious shopping by public transit is also a major PIA.*
(*Major shopping meaning you’re going to a number of stores and could very well buy several items of clothing, some kitchenware, dishes, small appliances, couple of pairs of shoes, etc. Nobody wants to lug that much stuff — and a couple of kids — on an STM bus.)
Ian 13:28 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
From Mile End I avoid driving downtown for any shopping, ever – which means either delivery or small purchases when I’m there. I mostly go downtown for events or to go to the museums or to meet friends at a restaurant. The burbs can’t compete with those things. For most things requiring big-box I find Marché Centrale sufficient. You’d have to be in a very specific location to find it more convenient to take the 15 to Laval than to go to Marché Centrale as it’s on the way – and if you want fancier than Marché Centrale there’s always the Rockland Centre kitty corner to it across Acadie. Personally I avoid Laval unless I’m visiting my in-laws or going to specific specialty stores like the one store that retails the resin casting supplies I use – there are lots of things in Laval besides malls, and certainly parking once you get there is the least of your worries.
SMD 14:08 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
Kate: Yes, that’s exactly it, the former Catholic item store and the others just north of it on the NW corner.
Kate 14:42 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
SMD: will they also be pushing out the old hardware store? The owner’s cranky but I know he has hardware bits nobody else does.
The space (it was a piano store when I moved in, and then a Catholic store that moved up from Notre-Dame in Old Montreal) has been an evangelical church for a couple of years now, windows frosted over. The building is nondescript but the hardware store would be a loss.
Kevin 14:55 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
@Jonathan
“Pauline Kael famously commented, after the 1972 Presidential election, ‘I live in a rather special world. I only know one person who voted for Nixon. Where they are I don’t know. They’re outside my ken. But sometimes when I’m in a theater I can feel them.’”
SMD 15:14 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
8300 to 8360 Saint-Laurent. Yes, the salty but oh-so-knowledgable hardware guy will be replaced by a four story residential building with 70 units. Interestingly in this case, as the project summary notes,
So they are actually asking for more parking spots (more than two per housing unit!) than the city rules would allow them to put in. The full 136-page PDF of the details and plans is here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Snd4irnWM58b5gcsanYKhmYyMmp8s9Xu/view.
Tim 15:15 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
All of this information is confusing and something doesn’t add up. Who owns these proposed parking spaces in the building? Are they planning to charge the public to park there? If so, who gets the money (I doubt it’s the condo board)?
It was reported that the Squamish Nation decided to forego large amounts of parking in their large condo development in Vancouver because it added $100k to the price of individual condos (https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/editorials/article-an-indigenous-developer-ignored-vancouvers-zoning-rules-and-all/).
I’m trying to understand how the developer will gain from this large expenditure.
dwgs 15:17 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
@Tim usually they sell or rent the extra spots.
Joey 15:26 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
Seems pretty clear the city planner is basically doing the sales job for the developer, probably because a bigger building with that many spaces will generate a huge windfall in taxes. So much for principles. We *need* two parking spaces per unit? I guess this is the kind of thing that drove Luc Ferrandez to quit.
Blork 15:58 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
I admit I’m a bit surprised that the number of parking spaces so outstrips the number of condos. Most condos come with one parking spot per unit, which add $30-40,000 to the unit price and are usually optional. The farther you get from downtown the more spots per unit (and those downtown buildings have fewer than one per unit).
Maybe they expect to have some commercial space in the building, and the additional parking spaces are for that.
Tim 16:04 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
I think you’re right Blork: the extra spaces must be for some commercial space. Anyone who buys in that building should ensure that the constitution divides up financial responsibilities in an equitable manner between residents and the commercial owner. They should also ensure that the total number of residential votes outnumber the commercial as well.
CE 17:05 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
Just to give another side to the discussion above, I live in Parc Ex and don’t have a car. Even though Marché Central is literally 6 blocks from my apartment, the thought of walking, biking, or taking the bus up there, crossing the highway then walking through all those parking lots into a massive store gives me anxiety just by thinking about it. I’d much rather do my shopping downtown or in the neighbourhood where the stores are smaller and the walking is much more pleasant. Also, if we’re going to talk about parking, with the exception of MEC, parking a bike is a nightmare in Marché Central!
Blork 18:16 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
Well, I don’t think anyone is saying that non-driving Montrealers are going to suburban malls on any regular basis. I mean that would be insanity, with nothing to gain. The ONLY reason to choose a suburban mall is for the parking.
So if it’s between driving to the suburban mall and driving downtown, the mall wins every time. If it’s between driving to the suburban mall and taking public transit downtown, the mall will still usually win if the shoppers are lugging kids and/or expecting to do some serious shopping.
Spi 19:36 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
I just had a look at the location and honestly, I think there’s one simple explanation for the extra parking spots, they’ll be building them anyway so why not make them available.
The lot is massive and occupies a lot of ground, they’ll be digging and pouring basement foundations and my guess is that they have extra underground space left over that would otherwise serve no purpose.
@CE have you been to marché central since their recent renovations? The central section, south of chabanel, (where the nike and SAQ is) is now filled with bicycle parking and if you don’t feel comfortable taking acadie and the acadie circle why not just go the back way from Avenue Querbes? It doesn’t show on google maps but there is a bicycle path and every time I pass by there are people walking to and from the Park-Ex side.
Kate 20:01 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
Spi, very occasionally I go to MEC, and I always forget just how hostile to pedestrians the whole Marché Central is, since no matter how you approach it there’s cars getting into your business one way or another. I was sorry to see the MEC satellite clothing store on St-Denis close, because most of what I’d buy at MEC is stuff like socks, not technical equipment for Everest base camp. Maybe the odd water bottle.
Ian 21:33 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
Poubelle de Ski on St. Laurent by Jarry is better for that kind of thing.
Blork 22:30 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
I dare say, I feel like Marché Central is so nasty it’s even hostile to drivers.
CE 23:04 on 2020-01-22 Permalink
@Spi, I’ve been there since the renovations and I’ve always found bike parking difficult. There are usually a couple crappy racks far from the door that are full of bikes so I have to ride around and eventually lock up to a pole in a median or something. And that’s after dodging extremely agressive drivers while constantly being surrounded by the most depressing urban landscape I can imagine.
I’m also aware of the Querbes access but I live very close to Acadie so that means a detour. The fact is that I find it to be a miserable place and the point I’m trying to make is that I’d rather travel two or three times further to downtown, despite media constantly telling us it’s somewhere we should avoid for not being enough like Marché Central.
I simply don’t understand why there is so much hand wringing about suburbanites not being able to drive into the city. As far as I’m concerned, a city that is difficult to drive to and in is a good city. The suburbs have their shopping areas and the city has its areas, both are designed to serve their target clientele.
Ian 15:52 on 2020-01-23 Permalink
Well there’s the rub, business owners want to attract as many potential clients as possible. We don’t live in an archipelago of tiny sovereign city states, we live in a metropolis, with neighbourhoods.
I agree that we shouldn’t maintain the inner city to suburban standards of comfort, but to say suburbanites should just stay off-island is fraught with many risks, not the least being the long-term viability of the city.
CE 17:57 on 2020-01-23 Permalink
@Ian, if people want to come from the suburbs, I’m fine with that. Just leave your car at home and if you absolutely must bring it, don’t complain that parking isn’t as easy as it is in the suburbs.