We have been following the city’s rezoning redesign efforts for the past few years with keen interest. On April 6, we presented at the Newton Highlands Area Council about 2 topics that we hear questions about regularly: Parking and The Fiscal Impact of New Developments on the City. We were surprised that there was no mention of our presentation or the discussion in the meeting report in Fig City News on April 14.
We have also been concerned about parking requirements and the financial impact of new zoning. Therefore, we undertook some research to help understand these important topics.
For parking we looked at both the impact of reducing parking requirements on cities and towns across the country and also specifically at parking in Newton.
To look at the financial impact of new development that might happen as a result of new zoning, we looked at the financial impact of recently completed, permitted and currently planned new development in the city.
Parking standards are currently being studied in the Village Center zoning effort, and there is a proposal to reduce the number of parking spaces required in or near villages and near transit. Current zoning in Newton requires two spaces for every new home planned, whether it is a single-family unit or a unit in an apartment building. And there is a whole array of parking requirements for different kinds of spaces like retail, restaurants, offices, etc.
Because parking is such a topic of interest, it’s fair to ask, “What’s wrong with building the current amount of parking anyway?”. There are a number of detrimental side effects to building more parking that we use:
Parking is expensive and takes up a lot of land.
- Higher construction costs due to parking have a greater impact on affordable housing because you can’t just increase the rent to cover the extra cost.
- Less housing can be built on a lot, and unit sizes are larger, making them more expensive.
- Requiring space for parking makes it harder for small businesses to locate in villages.
- The cost of parking gets passed to everyone in the higher cost of housing, goods and services – even if you don’t drive.
Parking is bad for the environment and the climate.
- More pavement increases the heat island effect and creates more stormwater runoff.
- Underground parking is one of the largest sources of carbon emissions in new construction.
- When more parking is available where people live, over time households own more cars and people drive more. So, more parking spots – more cars, more driving.
The Metropolitan Area Planning Council (MAPC) recently completed a study of parking at multifamily buildings in cities and towns west of Boston. By counting the number of parking spots in use during the middle of the night, they measured actual usage of parking compared to how much was available. The results are quite compelling; Newton and all communities studied have more parking available than is actually used.
In Newton:
- Only about half of the available parking spaces were in use.
- There were 1.5 spaces for the average housing unit.
- On average, there were only 0.8 cars parked per housing unit.
The MAPC study found that the largest influences on lowering the number of parking spaces per unit include: the percentage of units that are affordable, how close the development is to transit and how many jobs you can access via transit, and the number of parking spaces per unit.
Because almost all of the new homes in multifamily buildings are rental, we thought that it would be good to look at car ownership by renters in Newton. We found that renters have significantly fewer cars than homeowners. Almost 20% of renters do not have a car and around 45% only own one. In contrast only 3% of homeowners do not have a car and fewer than 30% have only one car. This points to significantly less parking needed for renters vs. homeowners. These differences can also cause a significant difference in one’s perception of parking needed if you are a homeowner.
Many cities and towns across the country have reduced or eliminated parking mandates. We were curious to find out what’s happened in those places. A few interesting trends are occurring:
- Even without mandated parking, most new developments have included some parking.
- Since many historic buildings were built with little or no parking, vacant or under-utilized historic buildings have been able to be renovated for housing or retail without the constraint of needing X number of parking spots.
- Less expensive housing has been built.
The second question we often hear asked is, “What will be the financial impact on the city from all this new development in Newton?” To answer this question, we analyzed the city’s projected annual income and expenses for 32 new developments in Newton. These projects date from 2016 and include 3,800 housing units – ones that have been recently built, recently permitted, or are currently under consideration.
The total annual net new revenue to Newton for these 32 projects would be approx. $18.1M, and come from property taxes, excise taxes, and CPA funds. (Net revenue = new revenue less revenue prior to the new development)
Expenses to the city for education, fire/EMS and police are projected to total $13.7M annually. This creates a projected annual benefit to the city of approx. $4.4M.
People who rent their homes in Newton have significantly fewer children in their households than people who own their homes – 20% of renters vs 40% for owners have children under 18. Since the new developments are primarily rental units, there would be fewer students added to the school system than one might imagine if you are coming from the perspective of a homeowner.
One-time payments for water & sewer infrastructure plus other public funding that support schools, parks, traffic and pedestrian safety, and utility undergrounding, among other things, add an additional revenue of $30M.
This figure represents just 60% of the projects for which data was currently available; the total one-time payments would actually be higher than this.
Along with a net benefit that is positive for the city’s finances, new residents would conservatively spend another $72M annually within Newton on groceries, restaurants, coffee shops, childcare and children’s activities, professional services, personal care services and of course, this being Newton, on care for their pets.
In summary, zoning that requires excessive parking prevents more housing from being built and causes the housing that is built to be more expensive than it needs to be. We think right-sizing the parking requirements to fit current trends in car ownership and usage makes sense in the village center rezoning process.
The fiscal impact of building more multi-unit housing creates an annual net positive result for the city. Additionally, the residents moving into these new homes bring tremendous benefits to business owners and local service providers, helping to create a vibrant community for all.