Public Space for People – Approaches to the Restitution of Parking Space

Abstract

The unequal distribution of both spatial and monetary resources has been favouring individual motorized transport above all other road users for several decades now. A rather significant proportion of these resources has always been dedicated to stationary traffic: private cars are parked in public space for free or at very little cost to the car owner. Parking of private vehicles in public space is not something that has slowly developed over time – on the contrary, keeping of private goods (like carriages) on the streets was uncommon and often prohibited in pre-automobile times – it was first and foremost political will that introduced a claim that changed the way streets were used quite rapidly. Since that paradigm shift, on-street parking has been considered an irrevocable right by many car owners. While individual voices have been calling for a reevaluation of a system that values cars over people since the very beginning, it was only recently that initiatives to restitute public space in urban areas to the people has gained momentum. Cities all over the world are taking different approaches to reach that goal, there are temporary measures, as well as solutions that permanently transform public space. Temporary projects i.e. pop-up residential streets or cycle tracks, usually make the start and aim to change the way public space is perceived. Permanent approaches include ones that do not require policy changes (i.e. parking spaces that do not meet the current legal requirements in size get removed), ones that do require policy changes (i.e. parking in residential streets gets prohibited), and indirect solutions that do not immediately regulate parking in public space (i.e. only a certain number of cars can be registered in the city).

This paper explores these functions and rights of use of public space and the international shift towards an understanding of public space as space for people as well as the subsequent approaches to the restitution of parking space and their effectiveness.