ACTION PLAYBOOK:
Abolish Parking Mandates
The Goal: Abolish local parking mandates to reduce transportation emissions and encourage greener urban land use.
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Municipalities across the country have laws that require commercial buildings to offer a minimum number of associated parking spaces. These mandates contribute to urban sprawl and car congestion while inhibiting low-emissions development that favors mass transit and walkability. The good news? There’s broad consensus that these mandates need to go, and our city council members are surprisingly accessible and have the power to change these local laws.
➡️ Action Overview
Identify who to contact
Craft and send your message
Ask a friend to do it too
Let’s take action.
➡️ Want more context? Jump to the bottom
➡️ Go deeper with these great resources from our friends at Strong Towns!
Step 1. Identify who to contact
Who you contact will depend on whether your city still has parking mandates in place. View the chart below or see the interactive parking mandates map from the Parking Reform Network to check whether your city has already eliminated parking mandates, then we’ll find the correct elected official’s email address.
➡️ My city STILL HAS parking requirements (most of them do). You’ll contact your city council member, since they have direct control over local laws. If you’re in a large city, you may be able to find your city council member on the USA.gov database. Otherwise, Google “[your city/town’s name] + find my council member.” Your town’s website should have office email addresses listed for council members.
➡️ My city has NO parking requirements. NICE! You’ll contact your state rep and ask them to abolish parking requirements statewide. Find your state reps here. Then, follow the rest of the steps below, but substitute the city council language to apply statewide.
Step 2. Send an email
Open a blank email, copy/paste the templates below, then edit and customize the message for your elected official. Please bcc advocacy@climatechangemakers.org so we can make note of our collective impact. Note there are different message suggestions depending on whether your elected officials are Democrats or Republicans (we’re playing a strategic game here!).
Hi, my name is [NAME], a constituent from [YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD/DISTRICT].
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I’m writing to urge you to eliminate any remaining minimum parking requirements in our city.
[I’m encouraged by our city’s progress on removing outdated parking codes in the city center, and I believe the rest of our city could benefit from similar reforms.] < To write this, you can use the same linked map with the “No Parking Requirements” toggled OFF. Write a sentence describing any progress your city has made and encourage them to take the reforms a step further. If you cannot find your city on the map, it’s likely that no progress has been made thus far. Adjust your sentence accordingly!
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I’m so proud that we have no parking requirements in [CITY/TOWN], and I’m writing to urge you to prioritize abolishing parking requirements statewide.
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Option 1: Abolishing parking minimums near transit hubs would help alleviate carbon-intensive car congestion in favor of cleaner, safer, more walkable cities.
Option 2: Parking minimums are excessive regulation on developers, who should be free to make their own decisions on parking capacity. Empty lots are a missed revenue opportunity for cities.
As a constituent, this is important to me because [WHY DO YOU CARE?].
If you’re comfortable, you can level up by adding: If you’re interested, I’d love to chat more about my concerns over [A PHONE CALL OR COFFEE.] Please reply via email or by phone at [###-###-####].
Thank you so much for your service to our community.
Hit send! If you receive a response, drop us a line at advocacy@climatechangemakers.org and let us know what they said! We’re happy to help with next steps if you’re interested in continuing the conversation.
Step 3. Ask a friend to do it, too
Network effects are powerful. Persuading friends and family to take climate action is a crucial step toward changing social norms and making real progress. Now that you’ve contacted your elected official, send a note to a friend along with a link to this playbook asking them to email their own elected officials. Bonus points if you happen to know someone who has real clout with their local government and you feel comfortable asking them.
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If you plan to have a more in-depth conversation with your city council member, consider compiling evidence that could help persuade them to push for parking reform. Strong Towns recommends four easy steps to create an observational case study that you can bring to your city council once you get a response to your email. Showing them what’s happening right outside goes a long way toward contextualizing an otherwise abstract argument and making the issue more emotionally resonant.
Additionally, if you want to learn more about parking reforms, there is a whole community of people working on this issue. The Parking Reform Network is here to help activists and partner organizations with research, messaging, and support.
And that’s it, playbook complete! Feel accomplished.
Thank you for taking action.
🎉 CUE CONFETTI by clicking COMPLETE! 🎉
Congrats, you just took productive climate action!
Or maybe you haven’t yet, and you just skipped down to this section. In any case, here’s some additional info to learn more about the problem we’ve got on our hands.
Learning by watching
(32 minutes)
Our friends at Climate Town create incredible (and very funny) videos about climate change and we provide specific actions to go with them! The Action Playbook you’re reading right now was made specifically for this Climate Town episode. Watch it to learn all about outdated parking mandates, then come back here to take action
Learning by reading
(3 minutes)
What’s the deal with parking minimums? Parking minimums are local regulations that require new businesses and residential buildings to offer a predetermined, and often arbitrary, number of parking spaces in dense, downtown neighborhoods. These mandates often result in developers losing valuable floor space that could be used for residential units or retail outlets. In some cases, meeting these requirements can cost as much as $75,000 per parking space, rendering some small projects infeasible. Worse, many of these mandated parking spaces go unused, which implies that consumer demand for parking is often less than the legally required supply. In economics, we call that “deadweight loss”—or just “a bad deal for everyone.”
Consequences for the climate. Parking minimums exist largely due to historical zoning laws and a car-centric view of urban development. But recently, they’ve come under scrutiny for their contribution to housing shortages and climate hazards. The availability of free or cheap parking incentivizes people to drive everywhere, leading to more sprawl and even more driving, and ultimately contributing to carbon emissions and congestion. As long as we perpetuate car culture in America’s cities, we’re missing out on investments in clean mass transit and green development that supports walking and biking.
The movement to abolish parking mandates is gaining steam. In Congress, the proposed People Over Parking Act of 2023 would allow property owners (not the government) to decide how many parking spaces to include in new or substantially renovated buildings within half a mile of a major transit stop. It was inspired by successful reforms in places like California, Minneapolis, and Buffalo that have since seen a boom in housing availability and a decrease in road congestion as a result. Progress at the state level has continued, with big 2023 parking reform wins in Vermont and Montana.
And unlike many contentious climate policy solutions, this one holds bipartisan promise. In local jurisdictions attempting to reform their parking mandates, stakeholders on both sides of the aisle have joined forces to support the movement. On the right, developers want greater freedom, lower costs, and general deregulation, while concerns about climate and housing affordability dominate the left. It’s a unique opportunity to leverage broad appeal and get our elected officials on board.
Thank you for taking action!
Questions? Concerns? Email info@climatechangemakers.org
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