to about one-third the land area required by today's best facilities for parking a given number of cars. The new development is a British-engineered, high-rise facility which I have recently helped introduce to the United States. The first U.S. installations are expected in 1966. The facility consists of a variable number of units or modules which may be combined in several forms to take best advantage of the shape of a lot and of access convenience. The basic structure of a unit consists of a central elevator shaft with multilevel parking bays either to the right and left or fore and aft. A motorist drives his car onto a pallet resting on a self-propelled dolly which itself rests on the floor of a high-speed freight elevator. The motorist steps into an adjacent bay or room, deposits a required number of coins, and withdraws an indicated key (as in the operation of a coin-operated luggage locker). All operations thereafter are automatic. The withdrawal of the key actuates an electromechanical control which causes the elevator to rise to an appropriate level and the dolly to move laterally into a vacant bay where it deposits the pallet and car and returns to the elevator. Another pallet is then picked up from an empty bay and taken to ground level for a repeat of the parking cycle. When the motorist wishes his car he inserts the key in the proper keyhole and his car is returned. Parking or delivery requires a minute to a minute and a half depending on the level used. Land area is conserved in two ways. First, the use of an elevator permits 12 to 20 levels of efficient parking. (The distance between levels may be less than the distance between floors of an office building). Secondly, on each level less space is required for access. Thus there is a higher ratio of revenue to nonrevenue space than in other types of parking facility. There is another important consideration concerning land use. A high-rise structure can be built on a narrow plot, of which there are quite a few still available in downtown Washington. The multiplication of land use permits a lower per car capital cost than is required for ramp-type garages. The operating cost is naturally much lower. I suggest that the logic of efficient land use which has resulted in high-rise construction of many office and residential buildings must inevitably apply also to parking garages and that the planning of adequate parking facilities should take account of impending technological change in the industry. I wish to state for the record that I have a financial interest in the company which will manufacture and install the type of facility that I have described but none in any parking company or in real estate that would be affected. Sincerely yours, Senator JOSEPH TYDINGS, Senate Office Building, Washington, D.C. PAUL R. PORTER, President. SILVER SPRING, MD., January 2, 1966. DEAR SENATOR TYDINGS: It is certainly good news to see that your subcommittee is going to work in advance of the January session to study the problem of real estate and parking management in the District, anent the freeway program and the development of rapid transit in this area. As one of your constituents who has worked singly and with several citizen groups in studying this very problem and the related difficulties that it poses for the Capital, I should like to commend your stand that whatever is done in this area should be done with the fact in mind that human beings must continue to exist in cities. There is simply no point in destroying them either by choking traffic and its attendant noise and air pollution, or by covering living spaces and parks, or making them inaccessible, with quantities of concrete. The cycle of ruination which planning for the automobile alone has brought to American cities should certainly proceed no further than it has in Washington; there are thousands of us who would be exceedingly vocal in support of diverting highway funds in cities for rapid transit construction if the contents of the bill you and Senator Bingham have advocated were more widely reported. I hope that it will come up this session and be voted on. Meantime, I speak for most of the residents of Montgomery County in supporting your efforts to regulate transportation planning so that it will reflect the true needs of citizens in this large and heterogeneous community. Sincerely, JOAN ASHLEY ENNIS. Hon. JOSEPH D. TYDINGS. FRANK M. DOYLE, REALTOR, District of Columbia, December 27, 1965. DEAR SENATOR TYDINGS: I think construction of above ground garages here would be extremely senseless, and I hope that no appropriations will be made available for such projects. My reasons are explained in the enclosed copy of letter I sent to the Commissioners on February 8, 1965. I shall be glad to discuss this matter with you at any time and drive you around the city for a couple hours to further explain my reasons therefor. Respectfully submitted. FRANK M. DOYLE. FRANK M. DOYLE REALTOR, District of Columbia, February 8, 1965. To the Honorable Commissioners of the District of Columbia: I have read that a committee appointed by you has recommended that an authority be created with power to acquire sites for garages by condemnation, if necessary, to meet the vexatious parking problem in our downtown. As an individual, and not as a representative of the Washington Board of Realtors, I must speak out against such acquisitions for aboveground garages. Before adoption of the Lewis zoning plan on May 12, 1958, meetings were held for a couple years prior thereto. I attended those meetings and the following is a paragraph out of one of my appearances: "No plan for our downtown should be mentioned that does not take into consideration the use of our many parks for underground parking. These underground garages could be used as shelters in the event of an air raid. I have in my possession contracts and other data concerning such garages in Los Angeles and San Francisco, which I shall make available. These garages, which were constructed by private enterprise without expense to the cities, pay rent to the cities and taxes and eventually become city property. One of these garages handled over 1 million cars last year. Later, the cities erected some such garages." Happenings since have convinced me of the soundness of that statement. In my opinion, nothing will be done along this line as long as parking problems are dominated by the parking interests. Many large sites have been acquired and the obsolete improvements razed for parking until such time as more productive use could be made of the land. As examples, consider the disappearance of parking lots south of Pennsylvania Avenue, west of 17th Street; in the vicinity of Connecticut Avenue and K Street, and in the area of my office at 15th and K Streets. There is no question that some of the lots now in use will give way to improvements, further adding to parking shortage. Generally, the sites closest to the downtown are developed first, usually with office buidlings, resulting in parking facilities moving farther out. I find no fault with the parking interests or others in these acquisitions and developments which improve the city. What I do find objectionable is the unfounded and selfish motives of the parking interests in opposing underground parking when they could possibly be the developers and operators. There have not been any private industry objections to the one underground garage in Los Angeles, but private garage industry has and now does usually oppose development or expansion of the municipal public underground parking program in San Francisco. The one, with 3 levels, in Los Angeles, with a capacity of 2,100 cars, was built by private subscription at a cost of about $4,500,000, is operated by private industry which pays a possessory interest tax to the city of around $125,000 annually. The four in San Francisco, which are operated by commercial operator and nonprofit corporations, are from three to six levels and were built for $1,500,000 in 1942 to $4,500,000 in 1960. Lessees pay possessory interest taxes to city as in Los Angeles. These underground parking garages will not be driven out of business by improvements. Nor will it be necessary to constantly increase parking rates because of increasing land costs. This can be quite a factor if we are going to revitalize our downtown which is in competition with the outlying shopping centers with free parking. If parking is as bad as the parking interests must agree, there seems to be room for underground parking without destruction of private industry. There will be fewer parking lots as the existing and future lots are improved. I am a strong supporter of private industry when it can do the job, but, there is not the remotest possibility that the problem can be met or alleviated without underground parking. I have heard this remark by private operators. "We are opposed to governmental interference." Parking in underground garages in governmental properties are far less an encroachment on private enterprise than the purchase or condemnation of private realty where properties are taken from some citizens for the benefit of others. In the acquisition of private sites for the construction of aboveground garages you would not only remove from the tax rolls taxes now in existence with no taxes on the new improvements, if owned by the city. The parking industry should bear in mind that they, like the rest of us, own the governmental reservations. This would be merely making use of something all of us already own. Parking lots and garages, while necessary, can and do create noxious influences in many instances; many have been of a grotesque appearance with a deterrent effect on other properties; they have destroyed the desirability of some streets; they tie up vehicular traffic and provide less protection for customers in inclement weather than underground parking; and at night when they are closed, they present a dark and barren atmosphere to neighborhoods. Office buildings and commercial stores employ far more persons than parking lots and large garages. Commercial establishments, other than aboveground garages, would be more conducive to the orderly development of our downtown and the retention of the citizens in our city. It is axiomatic that the more aboveground garages the less commercial buildings. If downtown is to experience any progress, we will have to have more, larger, and better shops to attract customers and not more such garages. Condemnation, even when done with restraint and a high order of business perception, usually adversely affects some owners, which would be avoided with underground parking. Let us consider the feasibility of acquiring sites for aboveground garages. Consider our downtown business center from 7th to 15th Streets and Pennsylvania to New York Avenues. This area is small and contains many improvements which, no doubt, would be left standing under any renewal program; places such as Woodward & Lothrop, Garfinckel's, St. Patrick's Church, First Congregational Church, Church of the Epiphany, several banks, the proposed public library, proposed Department of Justice Building, and others. Aboveground garages in what is left of this downtown area would be extremely unwise. Ground alone would possibly average $75 per square foot. This would mean location of such garages would have to be west of 15th Street, north of New York Avenue, and east of 7th Street. This would call for other transportation to get to the business center. You would run into a cost factor almost the same between 15th, 26th, and M Streets and Virginia Avenue. I believe that $2.1 million at $50 per square foot was rejected for the Western Market site. North of New York Avenue, bordering the business center to M Street, the same situation prevails with an average of about $40. Similar proposition would be encountered east of Seventh Street to Union Station. Add construction costs of a garage to a single site expenditure and the total could be several millions of dollars, an amount that would help the tax base if an office building or apartment were built in its stead. We are extremely fortunate in having our parks directly in the middle of all of our activities, obviating the necessity of additional transportation to any given point. Washington Circle, Farragut Square, Lafayette Square, McPherson Square, Franklin Square, Judiciary Square, Municipal Center and south of Constitution Avenue offer splendid future projections. Downtown is not the only parking problem, parking is serious near the White House, Washington Monument, and other places. Lafayette and Franklin Squares would be most ideal as starters because of their locations and sizes. Lafayette Square would not only serve local needs but tourists as well. I hope that we will never experience an air raid, but, if one ever comes to this country our city would probably be near the top of the list. In case of a war or internal trouble, an underground garage could be used for the billeting of troops or as an air raid shelter. Millions are being spent to educate and train our citizens in air raid matters. Air raid shelters in buildings would not be comparable to underground. I shudder at the thought of an air raid when I see thousands of tourists, many of them children, around the White House at certain times of the year. Franklin Square would be within walking distance to the entire downtown. Our citizens would get more use out of our parks than they do now and as a meeting place, there would be benches available. While I am not an authority on parking of any kind, I offer these observations for what they might be worth in the belief that the public interest is at stake. Respectfully submitted. FRANK M. DOYLE. COMMITTEE OF ONE HUNDRED ON THE FEDERAL CITY, Re Washington's parking problem. Hon. JOSEPH D. TYDINGS, Washington, D.C. DEAR SENATOR TYDINGS: The Committee of One Hundred on the Federal City has followed with great interest your hearings on Washington's parking problems and wishes to submit its views and the results of its studies for your consideration. We wish to express our gratitude for your interest in exploring the issues involved. As you suggest, the problem is inseparable from effective planning in transportation. We must state, however, our opposition to the bill introduced over your name (S. 2769), or to any other new legislation dealing with parking at the present time. The immediate need is for more facts and more study. As we see it, the present parking problem is essentially one of too much parking for too many cars in the wrong places for the wrong purposes, and at the wrong times. Existing legislative proposals would not solve these problems: they would compound them. The Committee of One Hundred on the Federal City has not reached a final judgment or decision on the problem of integrating parking planning with transportation planning. At its annual meeting, November 30, 1965, our membership did, however, adopt a statement of preliminary transportation recommendations, 1965-85 plan, a copy of which is enclosed for your information. You will note that with specific reference to parking in employment areas this statement says: "5. Terminal parking. The NCPC staff is to be commended for its proposal for rigid control and limitation of all-day parking in employment areas. Such steps should be accompanied by construction of new fringe parking facilities on transit routes outside of the District of Columbia." The National Capital Planning Commission has not yet reached its final judgment on the transportation planning policies, including transit, highways, and parking, that it believes should govern for the next 20 years. The final 1985 plan is not due to be issued until the summer of 1966. As the official planning agency for the District of Columbia, the Planning Commission is under the legal direction of Congress to serve as the overall coordinator of planning policies for our Nation's Capital. With this objective, the chairmen of both the Senate and House Distrist Committees are members ex officio of the Planning Commission, entitled to attend its meetings in person or to send an alternate. The Planning Commission cannot legislate. But its transportation planning responsibilities, including both parking and highways, undoubtedly will require recommendations to the Congress for an appropriate legislative program. We believe that it would be appropriate and desirable for the Congress to stay its hand on any new legislation affecting regulation, control, construction, or financing of highways and parking (or, indeed, further extensions of the presently authorized rapid transit system) until it has the benefit of the Planning Commission's studied recommendations, as well as the public's reaction thereto. Consistent with the stated planning objectives of the Planning Commission, we would also like to suggest for study the following proposed reforms for a sensible legislative program on parking. They are submitted, not as any final opinion on the matter by the Committee of One Hundred, but as positions that deserve a thorough study. 1. There is need to centralize authority over transportation planning, including parking, in the National Capital Planning Commission. 2. Existing tax incentives for offstreet commercial parking lots should be eliminated. 3. Except for resident parking in residential areas, all new offstreet parking should be subject to the rigid control of the Planning Commission. 4. The one type of parking that creates both a traffic and a parking problem (the all-day parker in employment areas) should be discouraged by levying a tax at least equal to the round-trip transit fare upon all cars entering a lot or garage between 7 a.m. and 9:30 a.m. 5. Except for resident parking in residential areas, all curbside parking on public streets should be subject to the control of the Planning Commission. 6. Encouragement should be given the Planning Commission for the creation of new fringe parking lots, outside of the District of Columbia, or east of the Anacostia River. 7. The existing District of Columbia motor vehicle parking fund should be abolished and all meter or other public parking revenues should become part of the District's general fund for unrestricted use. You will note that these recommendations do not contemplate the grant of authority, to the Planning Commission or otherwise, of any general power of eminent domain or any general power to use park and other public lands for parking. Although the Planning Commission should be free to recommend such courses of action, their implementation should require specific legislative action, as is the case today. This letter can only skim the surface of a problem that is exceedingly complex and seems to be generally misunderstood by the public. In order to document and supplement our views, I enclose a report prepared by the Chairman of our Roads Subcommittee that has been reviewed, revised, and supplemented at a meeting of the executive committee. In summary, the Committee of One Hundred on the Federal City is not so much concerned with increasing the total amount of parking as it is with achieving a truly balanced system of transportation which should actually decrease the need for parking in the downtown area. We also believe that all elements required to produce a balanced system of transportation should be under the planning control of the National Capital Planning Commission: this would certainly include highways, rapid transit, and parking. Respectfully yours, NEILL PHILLIPS, Chairman, Committee of One Hundred on the Federal City. FEBRUARY 4, 1966. Mr. NEILL PHILLIPS, Chairman, Committee of One Hundred on the Federal City, DEAR MR. PHILLIPS: Thank you for your recent letter expressing the views of the Committee on One Hundred on the Federal City of Washington's parking problem. The suggestion of the Committee of One Hundred that the District of Columbia levy a parking tax to discourage commuters from driving into the District of Columbia does not appear to me to be feasible or desirable at this time. The Committee of One Hundred would prefer that commuters use rapid tannsit. This is a laudable objective but the fact is that for many Maryland and Virginia commuters, existing bus service is inadequate and the proposed subway line is still a dream. The overwhelming testimony before my subcommittee from planning officials and highway users supports my bill to authorize the creation of a public parking authority. Before this authority took any action it would have before it a comprehensive study of the entire transportation system in our Nation's Capital. I am not equipped to prejudge the results of this report, but from the testimony before my subcommittee, there is every indication that even with a rapid transit system we will need a public parking program for at least five reasons: (1) Washington is the fastest growing metropolitan area in the country. (2) A large part of existing downtown parking spaces will disappear as office buildings continue to be constructed on parking lots. (3) Visitors urgently require parking in the Mall area. (4) Fringe lots will be needed in order to enable those who must drive to work to leave their cars part way and take public transit. (5) Washington's downtown business district will continue to decline both relative to the suburbs and absolutely unless it is reasonably accessible. Rightly or wrongly, many people, including shoppers, business visitors, the elderly and the handicapped, will prefer to use their cars rather than public transit, no matter how modern and convenient that transmit might be. I am convinced that downtown Washington will suffer unless convenient and reasonably priced parking is available for these short-term visitors. The enactment of S. 2769 will not necessarily result in the creation of a net addition of parking spaces in the downtown business district, but it will help insure that the spaces which are lost to new construction are replaced, in accordance with sound public policy. It will also enable the city to meet the parking needs of congested residential areas, such as Georgetown, as well as neighborhood shopping centers. |