the important variables. The more downtown employees there are, the more transit riders there will be, other things being equal. In this respect, Washington is in a favorable position with better than 30% of its employment in the downtown. Thus, one might expect fringe parking to have greater attraction here than in some other area.

6. POTENTIAL FRINGE PARKING SITES

6.1. General Considerations:

In attempting to find sites suitable for fringe parking in the Washington area, it is immediately apparent that no site will be found that will rate high on all points listed in the criteria presented in the previous section. If the site is within the ten mile square then it fails to meet the tests of minimum public costs since it will be inside of some major congestion points and it typically will be incompatible with adjacent land or will be costly. Undeveloped land is very scarce within the ten mile square and for each vacant acre remaining there are many plans, either private or public or both.

This

A systematic search was conducted in the area sector extending from northwest counterclockwise to south from downtown. is the area which has no formal fringe parking at present (except Columbia Island Marina on the south, however bus service to this facility may have to be eliminated in the near future, as discussed in a previous section). Sites were identified by use of Baist Maps, Aerial Photographs, field surveys and discussions with local officials. A number of sites were noted, many rejected for immediately apparent reasons, and about 30 selected for further evaluation. (See Fig. 6-1) These have been classified into three groups:

(1) Sites which meet usage criteria sufficiently to assure that

if parking facilities were established they would attract patronage. These sites are typically within the ten mile square,

involve the purchase of expensive land or are incompatible with present plans. They nevertheless, in some instances represent possibilities for successful fringe parking operations.

(2) Sites which generally do not rate favorably on the usage
criteria but which rate very high on other factors in the criter-
ia list. Most of them are located on existing parking lots which
are used usually only at night or weekends and thus could get
double use if used for fringe parking. Since public costs for
establishment of such facilities would be minimum, a number
of these sites rate high as potential experimental sites where,
for a relatively small outlay, it could be determined whether
fringe parkers can be induced to use such facilities.

(3) Sites which do not necessarily rate high on usage criteria, and which are located on undeveloped sites which are privately owned. Some of these are ideally located from the standpoints of having the maximum effect on reducing traffic flow over crowded portions of the urban area. These sites should probably be considered, only if some of the experimental sites in the previous classification are tried and proved successful.

6.2. Potential Sites:

Table 6-1 lists the sites evaluated and compares each to the evaluation criteria. A brief discussion of each site follows.

6.2.1. Sites rating high on Usage Criteria:

(1) Northwest corner of Connecticut Avenue and Van Ness Street,
National Bureau of Standards: This site is currently used for
parking of Bureau of Standards employees and will accommodate
approximately 135 cars. This same site is slated for a parking
garage to serve a rapid transit station in N. C. T. A. 's rail transit
plan. Perhaps the heaviest and best bus service in the region,
both peak and offpeak is available at the site and the area is
near some of the heaviest concentrations of curbside fringe
parking in the area. Since this site is already publicly owned,
it would require a minimum initial public expenditure. While,
there are some disadvantages to the site for fringe parking
(centered mainly around the competition for use of the land for
other purposes), this site is about as close to the ideal bus
fringe parking lot as is likely to be found, from the standpoint
of the usage criteria.

(2) Daingerfield Island Sailing Marina: The relatively small
parking lot currently located on this site is slated for expansion
to accommodate 204 cars. Heaviest demand for this facility is
during weekends so that double use fringe parking is a possibility.
Bus fare is 35 cents from this area which means that the motorist
can save by driving a bit closer to town before boarding the bus.
However parking at the curb is very limited further in. Bus

service is frequent and direct to downtown. Use of this facility