Ongoing YYCCC (Chu + Farkas) Transgressions Threat

[corporatejay]

Originally Posted by burn_this_city

There's a lot of junk filled garages in this city that would be emptied out if people had to pay to park their jalopy on the road. I do think its absurd you'd balk at paying a paltry amount to park your cars in a proverbial walled garden that the city tightly polices with signage and enforcement.

I honestly don't know what you are arguing. Are you angry people have stuff on their garage or that they park on the street?

[Roughneck]

Since we’re all entitled to free land for metal box storage, can I just plop down a shipping container in lieu of a car to free up garage space?

[corporatejay]

Originally Posted by Roughneck

Since we’re all entitled to free land for metal box storage, can I just plop down a shipping container in lieu of a car to free up garage space?

Why don't you want cars parked.on the street?

[Wormius]

Where exactly in the burbs are you being charged for street parking but don’t have a garage or driveway? Let’s say your garage has stuff in it, most still can fit 2 cars on the driveway.

[getbak]

Originally Posted by corporatejay

Did you read how this started? That's literally what I said. City is running low on revenue. Things are going to cost money. That's going to piss people off. Somehow me saying that became controversial.

Like Morgin said. We can debate whether people should pay for residential parking, but the city is starting to make people pay for residential parking.

Okay, then we agree. User fees for all.


The problem I have is that we all know that people aren't good with nuance and people like Farkas take full advantage of that. So, when he says "they want to charge you to park on the street in front of your house", he knows that will rile up people who will take it at face-value and won't actually look into the details and realize it's a small administrative fee for the small number of homes that are located in residential parking zones and will have no impact on the vast majority of Calgarians who live in the suburbs.

That CTV story on this is hilarious. It has a quote from Farkas that is five sentences long and he uses some variation of the phrase "pay to park in front of your own home" three times.



The funny thing is, until this made the news last year, I just assumed there was already a fee to get a parking permit. So, I was actually surprised when I first heard it, and like most people, my first reaction was, "What, they're going to charge for residential street parking?" Then, I read the details and thought, oh, I thought they already charged for that.

[morgin]

Originally Posted by getbak

Okay, then we agree. User fees for all.


The problem I have is that we all know that people aren't good with nuance and people like Farkas take full advantage of that. So, when he says "they want to charge you to park on the street in front of your house", he knows that will rile up people who will take it at face-value and won't actually look into the details and realize it's a small administrative fee for the small number of homes that are located in residential parking zones and will have no impact on the vast majority of Calgarians who live in the suburbs.

That CTV story on this is hilarious. It has a quote from Farkas that is five sentences long and he uses some variation of the phrase "pay to park in front of your own home" three times.



The funny thing is, until this made the news last year, I just assumed there was already a fee to get a parking permit. So, I was actually surprised when I first heard it, and like most people, my first reaction was, "What, they're going to charge for residential street parking?" Then, I read the details and thought, oh, I thought they already charged for that.

User fees for things like permit zone parking are a terrible idea to introduce directly because of budget shortfalls. I really wish they would focus on ensuring property taxes are sufficient for services, and if they aren't, then focus on properly budgeting for the services being provided and being up front about what they need.

Pitting Calgary citizens against each other in some sort of deathmatch to see whose subsidized services are more worthwhile is terrible and divisive and is going to lead to some pretty dark places over the next decade if that's the solution to the massive budget shortfall we're facing. It'll play directly into populist rhetoric as you said and will lower the general interest in matters that are actually relevant and important as people get burnt out fighting over stupid #### like residential parking fees.

$300 here, $200 there, etc. etc. depending on where in the City you live is an awful way to govern a City. Run a City, not a set of competing fiefdoms.

[corporatejay]

Originally Posted by getbak

Okay, then we agree. User fees for all.


The problem I have is that we all know that people aren't good with nuance and people like Farkas take full advantage of that. So, when he says "they want to charge you to park on the street in front of your house", he knows that will rile up people who will take it at face-value and won't actually look into the details and realize it's a small administrative fee for the small number of homes that are located in residential parking zones and will have no impact on the vast majority of Calgarians who live in the suburbs.

That CTV story on this is hilarious. It has a quote from Farkas that is five sentences long and he uses some variation of the phrase "pay to park in front of your own home" three times.



The funny thing is, until this made the news last year, I just assumed there was already a fee to get a parking permit. So, I was actually surprised when I first heard it, and like most people, my first reaction was, "What, they're going to charge for residential street parking?" Then, I read the details and thought, oh, I thought they already charged for that.

I'm finding this entire parking discussion entertaining but the origin was that I said it's going to be a tough decade for Calgarians. Province is cutting back and our city is struggling for revenue and so they are going to increase taxes and/or start charging for things that used to be free, like parking in front of your home.

Whether they should or shouldn't is a discussion worth having, but at the heart of it is that things are either going to get more expensive or the services are going to be reduced or both, none of which are good for the citizens of the city. Politicians will bear the brunt of this.

[Roughneck]

Originally Posted by corporatejay

Why don't you want cars parked.on the street?

I'm all for cars parking in the street, I just don't see why it should be free.



Why should a car owner get free storage space? Either there isn't enough for everybody, in which case the market should determine the value to deal with the scarcity. Or there is, and I should be able to use it to store other things with my allotment. Land isn't free, and there's opportunity cost in allocating significant parts of it for parking. If you don't think there's enough value in the land to make people pay, I'd ask why people need to park on the street and not on their own property in the first place.

[81MC]

Why can’t you store other things on the roadway? Because for a motor vehicle to be on the roadway, it must be registered, insured, and moveable? Fuel also carries a heavy tax that goes to fund infrastructure you can choose to cycle, walk, bus, or otherwise use.

[Flames0910]

Originally Posted by 81MC

Why can’t you store other things on the roadway? Because for a motor vehicle to be on the roadway, it must be registered, insured, and moveable? Fuel also carries a heavy tax that goes to fund infrastructure you can choose to cycle, walk, bus, or otherwise use.

But gas tax doesn’t even come close to covering the cost of roads, not to mention the excess space and sprawl caused by a city devoted to moving and storing vehicles.

You make it sound like drivers are doing us all a favour by paying for pedestrian, cycling and transit infrastructure but they’re not — they’re actually a huge burden on the taxbase because roads are an expensive way to move people around. Drivers don’t even pay for their own costs let alone secondary impacts and externalities born by society not by individual drivers.

[CliffFletcher]

As corporatejay says, budget shortfalls mean Calgarians are going to be faced with some combination of increased taxes, user fees, and reduced services. This will make voters unhappy. I don’t understand what’s controversial about that.

[Erick Estrada]

How is this parking tax to work? If both my wife and I park in our garage would we still pay the tax? I'm actually for a tax like this if it makes people start parking in their driveways and garages. I've always been surprised how many people in my community park in the street instead of their driveways. I get that a lot of people use their garages for storage but it to see residential streets lined up with cars while driveways are empty and it doesn't make a lot of sense to me.

[MoneyGuy]

I have a garage with two cars, a Good Wing, a motorcycle trailer (standing on end in a corner) and lots of junk. I should do a how-to podcast or reality show.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by Erick Estrada

How is this parking tax to work? If both my wife and I park in our garage would we still pay the tax? I'm actually for a tax like this if it makes people start parking in their driveways and garages. I've always been surprised how many people in my community park in the street instead of their driveways. I get that a lot of people use their garages for storage but it to see residential streets lined up with cars while driveways are empty and it doesn't make a lot of sense to me.

If the end result was narrower streets and no street parking and increased density I would sign up but the idea of charging for a resource that is not scarce doesn’t make sense. People parking in their drive ways or garages in a burb has no societal value.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by Flames0910

But gas tax doesn’t even come close to covering the cost of roads, not to mention the excess space and sprawl caused by a city devoted to moving and storing vehicles.

You make it sound like drivers are doing us all a favour by paying for pedestrian, cycling and transit infrastructure but they’re not — they’re actually a huge burden on the taxbase because roads are an expensive way to move people around. Drivers don’t even pay for their own costs let alone secondary impacts and externalities born by society not by individual drivers.

Are you sure that the gas taxes don’t cover road budgets in Canada? I’ve heard this before but never seen it mathed out

[PsYcNeT]

Laughing at all the homeowners with $600k+ properties whinging about an extra $125 bucks a year when this kind of blanket policy will disproportionately affect renters or lower-cost housing without garages more than anyone else.

[timun]

Originally Posted by morgin

What a weird response. The entire inner city is largely permit parking. I was assuming that's what he meant, and I assume lots of others here did too. Did you seriously think the topic was about the City proposing that people in Tuscany pay for street parking?

I seriously believed corporatejay believed the topic was about proposing that people in Tuscany pay for street parking, hence why he was in such a froth about it.

And the inner city is largely NOT permit parking. Permit parking is very selectively applied to streets that petitioned for it, not blanket applied everywhere in a neighbourhood.

[Flames0910]

Originally Posted by GGG

Are you sure that the gas taxes don’t cover road budgets in Canada? I’ve heard this before but never seen it mathed out

100% sure.

I don't know who Patrick Johnstone is, but his blog came up when I did a quick Google. His math ends with $146 per driver per year, of which $20 actually goes to roads. https://www.patrickjohnstone.ca/2014...for-roads.html

Of note as well he cites just 1% of the national gas tax fund going to active transportation projects.

This is an interesting, and I think important point.

Every dollar not spent on gas is likely spent in other ways, and when spending on things (be they car things or non-car things) they provide revenue in the form of sales taxes and in income taxes of the people who are selling stuff. That is the nature of our economy. Through the magic of “General Revenue”, just as much of those taxes go to funding roads and bridges as the sales taxes on gasoline does. In this sense, the more you use the roads, the less you likely pay for your share of their use.

There was also a study in Ontario that found that tolls and vehicle registration fees factored pretty heavily into road funding. That said they did not account for externalities which significantly push the needle towards society rather than drivers: https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/201...air-share.html

I seriously believed corporatejay believed the topic was about proposing that people in Tuscany pay for street parking, hence why he was in such a froth about it.

As an inner city resident who lives on a permit street, the hilarious thing is that Tuscany folks are still subsidized. I don't park on the street but the city provides me with guest passes so that people who visit me can park their car on the street. When the city removes that, I'll have to pay for that myself (or make all my friends pay for parking). So if corporatejay were to come to my place for a drink, instead of the city subsidizing his parking, it will be me.

[chedder]

Nm

[Bigtime]

Timely opinion piece from former Calgary Chief Planner Rollin Stanley:

Reversing Calgary’s downtown death spiral – and its future tax nightmare – will require unpopular measures

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opin...l-of-calgarys/