I love this quote from the mayor:

The fact that you park your private car in a public space is crazy: if you don’t have room for your freezer, do you put it on the sidewalk?

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nonethewiser 6 days ago | parent | next [-]

I dont think its a very good analogy.

I completely understand dedicating space to public transport instead of cars. But dedicating space to cars seems entirely reasonable in isolation, because the city has an interest in making it possible to get there. Parking spaces store cars - but is that their entire function? Or is that just an aspect of enabling people to drive into the city?

Consider the fact that you cannot in fact store a freezer in a public parking space. Nor even a car, actually, beyond a certain period of time, precisely because it's all about enabling movement.

	▲	alistairSH 6 days ago \| parent \| next [-]
		Yeah, it's a not perfect analogy. But, when talking about the expectation* that every public space have acres of free-to-use public parking, it makes a fair amount of sense. * In my experience, this is a very common expectation in the USA.
	▲	EE84M3i 6 days ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		Many places have on street parking that is used by residents (e.g. you get the "have to move my car twice a month because of street sweepers" effect). It's possible that's what the quote is referring to. Compare Brookline MA, which allows on-street parking, but only during the day to neighborhoods in Boston proper which has free on-street parking permits for residents.

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tfrutuoso 5 days ago | parent | prev [-]

I don't pay nearly weekly road taxes for my freezer. I pay for my cars and bikes, so that the law grants me that ability to park. It's easy to understand.