Pedestrians pass through a parking lot in Toronto’s east end, on Sept. 27, 2024.Sammy Kogan/The Globe and Mail
Protesters like to quote Gandhi’s advice to “be the change that you wish to see in the world.” This may feel hopeless at times, as crises come in waves. But small efforts really can lead to major results.
This approach can’t stop unjustified tariffs or stitch together a polarized country. Still, people who want to create a better world can focus on making their own difference.
A youth in Nova Scotia managed to shame government into removing hundreds of pipes dumping sewage into the LaHave River, near Bridgewater. Eleven-year-old Stella Bowles drew attention to the problem with a sixth-grade science project. From that start, it took years – Ms. Bowles is now in university – but the last of the pipes was taken out in 2023.
In Spain and Portugal, the Iberian lynx had dwindled to just 62 adult animals in 2001, making it critically endangered. Its rebound was driven by breeding programs and protection for the wild rabbits central to its diet, but also crucial were conservationists plugging away to restore habitat and create wildlife corridors. By last year the adult population was up 10-fold and the lynx’s status upgraded to vulnerable.
And a UCLA academic and parking policy reformer named Donald Shoup motivated cities across North America to change how they developed. An unlikely celebrity – he was dubbed Shoup Dogg and his devotees call themselves Shoupistas – he died earlier this month.
All of these people made the world a better place. But Mr. Shoup is a particularly noteworthy example.
An animal population dwindling or sewage flowing into a river are problems that announce themselves. They need champions to take up the fight but there’s no dispute something is not right. What Mr. Shoup did was identify a problem in an obscure area of urban planning, where few people understood there to be a concern.
An economist by training, Mr. Shoup made his name with the 2005 book The High Cost of Free Parking. He could have been an ivory-tower academic, immersed in obscure research. Instead, his book became a bible for urbanists.
Before he came along, North American cities had strict rules about the minimum amount of off-street parking needed outside different types of business or residential development. The formula was usually very precise, such as seven spaces for each lane of a bowling alley. But Mr. Shoup found these rules were typically arbitrary. And more important, they helped to encourage driving and to discourage housing.
Mr. Shoup explained the bogus logic underpinning parking requirements. He also advocated for a new approach to curb parking, arguing it should be expensive enough to encourage turnover. The ideal price was one that would leave no more than 85 per cent of spaces occupied.
These changes are not intuitively friendly to drivers. But motorists also benefit from his approach.
Studies show that a substantial portion of downtown congestion results from drivers looking for a cheap spot at the curb. Reduce that traffic and life improves for everyone else on the road. Remove acres of free parking outside businesses and people will be less likely to drive for all their errands. That also cuts pollution and makes cities more pleasant.
There’s also a basic fairness argument. When condos and apartments are forced to provide parking, the cost of it is bundled into rent or purchase prices. This makes housing less affordable and penalizes those who don’t have a car. Non-drivers subsidize drivers.
These policies lasted decades. They were rarely questioned before Mr. Shoup, whose ideas gradually gained traction. In 2020, Edmonton was the first major city in Canada to repeal its parking minimums. Henceforth, developers could determine how much parking their buyers would want. The market was allowed to speak.
Parking minimums are now history in dozens of North American cities, according to a group that tracks this. Among them are a number of Canadian municipalities. Toronto repealed minimums in 2022 and Regina, Saskatoon and Vancouver in 2024.
There has been some backsliding – Toronto decided last year that suburban rooming houses, of all places, needed parking minimums – but the trend now appears entrenched.
The seemingly minor policy change Mr. Shoup identified is helping make urban areas more affordable and less congested. His quiet persistence is but one example of a seemingly small change making an outsized difference.