Why Denver needs to address parking now

Denver needs to address a major issue: parking. Have you noticed that two cars can no longer pass on a side street? The streets are jammed with cars on both sides. It can be a real hassle having to stop to let someone else pass on many of the narrower streets. Downtown Denver is doing its part to fix the problem, but they can’t address single-family home neighborhoods.

Until a few years ago, traffic and parking in Denver have occasionally been a nuisance, but never as bad as in cities like Washington, DC, or Manhattan. Although there are many rumors that this had to do with the legalization of marijuana that happened in Colorado, our real estate market was still pretty cheap (until recently), compared to California and New York. In addition, IT and biotech jobs have brought a boom in wealthy employees to the area, with considerably more earning power than the lowest-paying/lowest-paying careers in the city. In some neighborhoods, residents have to get a special permit just to park on their street, so they don’t get ticketed or even towed. As cities grow, so does the issue of parking, from downtown to the suburbs.

Denver’s population continues to increase at a rapid rate. There are currently just over 3 million people living in the Denver metropolitan area, and it’s safe to say that the population will continue to grow. The increasing number of people and vehicles equals an increased need for parking, not just in downtown Denver, but throughout the surrounding area. Civil engineering projects are typically a couple of decades behind current construction, due to massive project costs and votes on which projects get priority. With this in mind, we need a more efficient way to accommodate all the influx still projected to come to the area.

In many of Denver’s suburban areas, there are narrow alleys between streets to accommodate the small amounts of traffic the area used to see. There is never enough street parking in some neighborhoods, and even people who live on a street don’t always get the parking spot they prefer when they come home from work. In the suburbs, the city cannot be expected to deal with these problems. It is the families who need to address the problem themselves. Fortunately, we have other options here in Denver that allow us to preserve our beloved open spaces, parks, and other beautiful natural settings.

There are many newly built structures that feature storefront properties on the ground floor and residences above, with parking garages built into the basement levels. While this is a large initial attempt to address new parking needs, parking lots and parking lots take up approximately 20% of Denver’s landscape. This is often a pain in the eyes, not to mention a tremendous waste of real estate. We need to multitask our acreage more efficiently. This space multitasking can also be applied on a smaller scale.

Many suburban neighborhoods in Denver are transforming and/or tearing down older, small houses into contemporary homes. Why not design your new home with the garage underneath? If you have the ability to dig, why not literally start from scratch to create a space that works best for the limited space you have? If digging a larger space under the soon-to-be-created home is simply not an option, try to plan your lot so that it can at least accommodate the number of cars the home will need at full capacity to help the entire community reduce the number of cars to be parked on the street. By providing a part of the solution, each of us can collectively help achieve better traffic and less congestion in the future.