Developers in Denver could skip building parking spaces for future construction projects under proposed rules being weighed by Denver City Council.
The council’s Land Use, Transportation and Infrastructure committee debated a proposal to abolish parking minimums — the rules that mandate a minimum number of parking spaces to be built for new construction projects.
The proposal builds on a recent state law that prevents cities from enforcing “parking minimums” in certain areas near transit lines starting this summer. While the state law would abolish parking minimums in much of the city, Denver’s new proposal would go further, eliminating parking requirements entirely across the city.
Discussions about the proposal started in December, but the vote in the LUTI committee on Tuesday was the first official action taken by the city council.
Here’s how parking currently works in Denver and how those rules could change.
Under current rules, developers must build a minimum number of parking spots for many new developments. The number depends on an area’s zoning and the type of development.
For example, market-rate apartments must have one parking spot per home. Restaurants require four spots per 1,000 square feet of indoor space.
Some projects have been exempt from Denver parking minimums. Single-family homes and accessory dwelling units don’t have minimum parking requirements. Downtown neighborhoods are also exempt from those rules.
Under the proposed rules, there simply wouldn’t be parking minimums across the city. The proposal wouldn’t ban developers from building parking — many developers already choose to build more parking than the city requires. The Dorsey Apartments in Five Points had no required parking, but the developers still chose to build 217 parking spaces.
However, many new developments have taken advantage of the lack of parking minimums downtown. The Populus Hotel, which opened last October, has zero parking spots.
Billsponsors include council members Sarah Parady, Chris Hinds, Flor Alvidrez, and Darrell Watson.
They argue that removing parking minimums will reduce development application times, promote more housing development and free building projects from restrictive laws surrounding parking.
City officials have already solicited public feedback.
The city held three town hall meetings about the parking minimum proposal, in addition to collecting responses on an online survey.
Over 300 respondents took the online survey. About 78 percent of them supported the parking amendment. Many responses said that eliminating parking minimums will help reduce the city’s dependency on cars.
Some comments went a step further — they wanted to mandate a maximum number of units instead of allowing developers to build unlimited parking spots.
“I hope that the city will consider going a step further, though, and explore a potential parking maximum provision,” one respondent wrote. “As you mention in the project overview, many developments build more parking than is necessary, so simply removing minimums may not have a huge impact.”
People against the amendment said removing parking minimums would squeeze already limited spaces in busy neighborhoods.
“Parking is already difficult even with permits, City Park Jazz visitors and now high rises that will push more cars onto the streets where there aren’t enough spaces already and with
the BRT taking spaces off of Colfax,” one South City Park resident wrote.
The city council might be divided on the issue.
During initial conversations about the amendment in December, several council members expressed concern about whether their constituents want to abolish parking minimums.
That theme continued at Tuesday’s committee meeting. Although all council members present voted to move the proposal in front of the entire council, many were worried about residents’ reactions.
“While I don't think their worst fears are going to play out, I don't think their concerns are irrational at all,” said Councilmember Paul Kashmann.
The full city council will have to approve the proposal before Mayor Mike Johnston can sign it into law.
