requiring mandatory parking at all sites doesn’t just make the city physically harder to navigate on foot; it also functions as a huge giveaway to drivers. A little bit of every bar tab, the receipt from a child’s toy, the price of a pedicure: every dollar you spend out there in the world is paying for the provision of those free, required parking spaces, whether you use them or not. Not surprisingly, all this free or cheap parking—at your house, at your office, on the street, in public lots and garages downtown—induces people to drive. (And exerts a relative financial penalty on those who
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