Center Parking

[US 89]

Highlands, NC: https://goo.gl/maps/2oqbfJBmsgWnFunW7

[HighwayStar]

DC at the end of Pennsylvania Ave was like this last I was down there.

Only the block between 3rd St NW and 1st St NW...and that parking is restricted to Senate personnel.

The "ultimate" configuration of this would be to have a 3-4 foot sidewalk median with parallel parking on both sides of it, thereby maximizing parking. But I am not aware of anyplace that has such a formal system.

5 foot minimum to meet ADA.


One not mentioned yet:  Goodyear Blvd in Picayune, MS.  The closest I know of to HighwayStar's "formal system", though it's only a narrow 2ft curb median in the middle instead of a sidewalk.

I would prefer the ADA be waived here. It would be stupid to put handicapped spots in the middle of the street in the first place, those should be located on the sides. Therefore why bother with a 5' sidewalk that is only to serve people parking in the middle?

[jemacedo9]

See Philadelphia. https://www.google.com/maps/@39.9335879,-75.1678143,357m/data=!3m1!1e3!5m1!1e1 - on S Broad St.

IIRC, the center lane parking in Philly is (or maybe was) technically illegal...but it has happened so often for so long that it is not enforced at all.

[froggie]

DC at the end of Pennsylvania Ave was like this last I was down there.

Only the block between 3rd St NW and 1st St NW...and that parking is restricted to Senate personnel.

The "ultimate" configuration of this would be to have a 3-4 foot sidewalk median with parallel parking on both sides of it, thereby maximizing parking. But I am not aware of anyplace that has such a formal system.

5 foot minimum to meet ADA.


One not mentioned yet:  Goodyear Blvd in Picayune, MS.  The closest I know of to HighwayStar's "formal system", though it's only a narrow 2ft curb median in the middle instead of a sidewalk.

I would prefer the ADA be waived here. It would be stupid to put handicapped spots in the middle of the street in the first place, those should be located on the sides. Therefore why bother with a 5' sidewalk that is only to serve people parking in the middle?

Disabled people drive too, and handicapped spots are not always available.

Furthermore, there are two logical reasons having nothing to do with ADA where a 5ft (or wider) sidewalk would be useful.  A)  to avoid opposing doors being opened into each other, and B) so pedestrians walking to/from their cars don't get "doored".  The former can be done with that same 5ft.  The latter would probably require something more like 6-8ft.

[HighwayStar]

DC at the end of Pennsylvania Ave was like this last I was down there.

Only the block between 3rd St NW and 1st St NW...and that parking is restricted to Senate personnel.

The "ultimate" configuration of this would be to have a 3-4 foot sidewalk median with parallel parking on both sides of it, thereby maximizing parking. But I am not aware of anyplace that has such a formal system.

5 foot minimum to meet ADA.


One not mentioned yet:  Goodyear Blvd in Picayune, MS.  The closest I know of to HighwayStar's "formal system", though it's only a narrow 2ft curb median in the middle instead of a sidewalk.

I would prefer the ADA be waived here. It would be stupid to put handicapped spots in the middle of the street in the first place, those should be located on the sides. Therefore why bother with a 5' sidewalk that is only to serve people parking in the middle?

Disabled people drive too, and handicapped spots are not always available.

Furthermore, there are two logical reasons having nothing to do with ADA where a 5ft (or wider) sidewalk would be useful.  A)  to avoid opposing doors being opened into each other, and B) so pedestrians walking to/from their cars don't get "doored".  The former can be done with that same 5ft.  The latter would probably require something more like 6-8ft.

Parking lots rarely if ever have a 5 food walkway between cars to ensure doors don't open into each other, so that is hardly a requirement.
Pedestrians should only be using the walk to the end of the block to and from their cars, hardly enough foot traffic to warrant a wider sidewalk over fears of being doored.

[GaryA]

Hawthorne Blvd in Lawndale, CA has a wide enough center median that there is angled parking (in places, one-way only; in others, two-way) that is separated from the main roadway.   GSV: https://goo.gl/maps/8xtvpwAmq3JAQajs7

This was once part of a state highway (that became CA 107 in the 1964 renumbering), although this portion of the highway has been relinquished to the city.  The median is so wide because there were light rail trains running there.

[CtrlAltDel]

Also I am pretty sure Wall SD has a sign (one of their many signs that start about the time you enter South Dakota) that highlights the "free parking" available, as if you could charge for parking in a state like South Dakota.

I'll play your game.

Obviously the city center of Sioux Falls is not what I meant but sure. 

What about this?

[HighwayStar]

Also I am pretty sure Wall SD has a sign (one of their many signs that start about the time you enter South Dakota) that highlights the "free parking" available, as if you could charge for parking in a state like South Dakota.

I'll play your game.

Obviously the city center of Sioux Falls is not what I meant but sure. 

What about this?

Lets cut to the chase. Have you ever actually driven through the middle of South Dakota, where Wall Drug is? If not, do so and you will understand my point. If you have, you should already get the point.

[CtrlAltDel]

Also I am pretty sure Wall SD has a sign (one of their many signs that start about the time you enter South Dakota) that highlights the "free parking" available, as if you could charge for parking in a state like South Dakota.

I'll play your game.

Obviously the city center of Sioux Falls is not what I meant but sure. 

What about this?

Lets cut to the chase. Have you ever actually driven through the middle of South Dakota, where Wall Drug is? If not, do so and you will understand my point. If you have, you should already get the point.

Is this close enough to the middle of the state for you?

And if you want to cut to the chase, you said, and I quote:

as if you could charge for parking in a state like South Dakota

And I wanted to see if that was in fact the case or not. And it turns out that there are any number of places that do charge for parking. Now you know.

[Scott5114]

Parking lots rarely if ever have a 5 food walkway between cars

I'm pretty sure I've seen at least one McDonald's parking lot that someone spilled enough fries in to qualify.

[zachary_amaryllis]

The problem with the center parking i mentioned at the top of this thread...

.. is that it's accessible from both sides, meaning there's potential (though at low speed) for head-on's, plus, if you're driving forward to leave one, the sight lines are a little weird.

.. and that I feel like vehicles might have been shorter when this was set up originally. There's always giant trucks or SUV's that have their ass end poking out into the left lane. The same issues really apply with the side-of-street parking as well.

This part of town is on US 287, and the downtown area where this exists is pretty congested most of the time unless it's the middle of the night. People just plain don't look when backing out of these spaces. When driving through this area, you have to really be on guard for reverse lights.

[HighwayStar]

The problem with the center parking i mentioned at the top of this thread...

.. is that it's accessible from both sides, meaning there's potential (though at low speed) for head-on's, plus, if you're driving forward to leave one, the sight lines are a little weird.

.. and that I feel like vehicles might have been shorter when this was set up originally. There's always giant trucks or SUV's that have their ass end poking out into the left lane. The same issues really apply with the side-of-street parking as well.

This part of town is on US 287, and the downtown area where this exists is pretty congested most of the time unless it's the middle of the night. People just plain don't look when backing out of these spaces. When driving through this area, you have to really be on guard for reverse lights.

The fix for the first is the sidewalk I proposed.
Long vehicles are not new. Ever seen a 60's Lincoln Continental? Longer than most SUVs today.

[jakeroot]

The fix for the first is the sidewalk I proposed.

Disregarding the ADA is a non-starter, the potential for litigation is astronomical; you'd spend more on court costs than you would designing a compliant sidewalk to begin with.

[HighwayStar]

The fix for the first is the sidewalk I proposed.

Disregarding the ADA is a non-starter, the potential for litigation is astronomical; you'd spend more on court costs than you would designing a compliant sidewalk to begin with.

You are assuming I am thinking from the view of some local entity designing sidewalks. No, I am actually thinking the Federal government just uses its unlimited fiat and tears up the ADA wherever it would conflict with this design. Something to the effect of "all prior legislation conflicting with X is hereby null and void", problem solved.

[Scott5114]

The fix for the first is the sidewalk I proposed.

Disregarding the ADA is a non-starter, the potential for litigation is astronomical; you'd spend more on court costs than you would designing a compliant sidewalk to begin with.

You are assuming I am thinking from the view of some local entity designing sidewalks. No, I am actually thinking the Federal government just uses its unlimited fiat and tears up the ADA wherever it would conflict with this design. Something to the effect of "all prior legislation conflicting with X is hereby null and void", problem solved.

Unconstitutional. Congress passed the ADA; only Congress can repeal it. FHWA cannot overrule it by fiat.

Long vehicles are not new.

Carpenter school buses were last made in 2001, so they would indeed be long vehicles that are not new. But you knew that already.

[Dirt Roads]

DC at the end of Pennsylvania Ave was like this last I was down there.

Only the block between 3rd St NW and 1st St NW...and that parking is restricted to Senate personnel.

The "ultimate" configuration of this would be to have a 3-4 foot sidewalk median with parallel parking on both sides of it, thereby maximizing parking. But I am not aware of anyplace that has such a formal system.

5 foot minimum to meet ADA.


One not mentioned yet:  Goodyear Blvd in Picayune, MS.  The closest I know of to HighwayStar's "formal system", though it's only a narrow 2ft curb median in the middle instead of a sidewalk.

I would prefer the ADA be waived here. It would be stupid to put handicapped spots in the middle of the street in the first place, those should be located on the sides. Therefore why bother with a 5' sidewalk that is only to serve people parking in the middle?

Disabled people drive too, and handicapped spots are not always available.

Furthermore, there are two logical reasons having nothing to do with ADA where a 5ft (or wider) sidewalk would be useful.  A)  to avoid opposing doors being opened into each other, and B) so pedestrians walking to/from their cars don't get "doored".  The former can be done with that same 5ft.  The latter would probably require something more like 6-8ft.

Having been an enforcer of ADA regulations on public transit projects (which is by no means my area of expertise), I should interject that it is possible to meet ADA requirements with narrow sidewalks by not permitting any wheelchair to the sidewalk.  In the case of center-of-the-street parking, such an arrangement would require wheelchair cut-throughs with fully marked crosswalks at each cut-through.  (For the record, I'm not sure that I would have ever accepted/approved such an arrangement without a couple levels of safety reviews and an alternatives evaluation).

All that being said, you could simply enforce the ADA requirement and provide the cross-over safety prohibition (as suggested by HighwayStar) by installing curb blocks for each parking space so as to provide the 5-foot wide ADA sidewalk in roughly the same space as a 4-foot wide non-ADA sidewalks with 6-inch standard curbs around the entire sidewalk.

But as I mentioned in a previous post in another thread, the biggest issue that I have seen with left-hand diagonal parking (on a multi-lane street) is that drivers still tend to treat the left lane of the street as the "fast lane".  Backing out into 40MPH traffic is quite dangerous unless the view is nearly unobstructed (no matter how low the posted speed limit is).

[HighwayStar]

The fix for the first is the sidewalk I proposed.

Disregarding the ADA is a non-starter, the potential for litigation is astronomical; you'd spend more on court costs than you would designing a compliant sidewalk to begin with.

You are assuming I am thinking from the view of some local entity designing sidewalks. No, I am actually thinking the Federal government just uses its unlimited fiat and tears up the ADA wherever it would conflict with this design. Something to the effect of "all prior legislation conflicting with X is hereby null and void", problem solved.

Unconstitutional. Congress passed the ADA; only Congress can repeal it. FHWA cannot overrule it by fiat.

Long vehicles are not new.

Carpenter school buses were last made in 2001, so they would indeed be long vehicles that are not new. But you knew that already.

The supreme court can make whatever it pleases constitutional regardless of what congress actually wants. And when I am talking about federal fiat, that is the total fiat power of the federal government, not that of any particular body. Collectively, the federal government has essentially unlimited fiat power.

[Dirt Roads]

Oh, and I used to drive a 1975 Pontiac Catalina that officially was 18'-10" long (and sometimes seemed longer).

[Rothman]

The fix for the first is the sidewalk I proposed.

Disregarding the ADA is a non-starter, the potential for litigation is astronomical; you'd spend more on court costs than you would designing a compliant sidewalk to begin with.

You are assuming I am thinking from the view of some local entity designing sidewalks. No, I am actually thinking the Federal government just uses its unlimited fiat and tears up the ADA wherever it would conflict with this design. Something to the effect of "all prior legislation conflicting with X is hereby null and void", problem solved.

Unconstitutional. Congress passed the ADA; only Congress can repeal it. FHWA cannot overrule it by fiat.

Long vehicles are not new.

Carpenter school buses were last made in 2001, so they would indeed be long vehicles that are not new. But you knew that already.

The supreme court can make whatever it pleases constitutional regardless of what congress actually wants. And when I am talking about federal fiat, that is the total fiat power of the federal government, not that of any particular body. Collectively, the federal government has essentially unlimited fiat power.

This particular conversation has gone from theoretical to bonkers.

[jay8g]

Thorndyke Ave W in Seattle has parking on the median side only (not on the curb side) in one direction. I'm pretty sure the curbside parking restriction predates the bike lane, since the pavement doesn't look wide enough for parking and a travel lane. I have to wonder if this was the originally-intended design, or if people just parked on the unpaved median enough that it eventually became formalized.

The same thing happens on some segments of S Mt Baker Blvd, but it makes much less sense there. I can't see any reason why they would have put the parking on the median rather than the outside edge of the roadway here.

14th Ave NW has some segments of informal perpendicular parking, and others with landscaped medians, central sidewalks, and parallel parking.

[Bruce]

Ballard's 14th Avenue NW is also median-only for parking, taking advantage of a wide former railroad ROW. Further north, a section was converted into Gemenskap Park, resulting in an awkward merging of the divided lanes.

[HighwayStar]

Ballard's 14th Avenue NW is also median-only for parking, taking advantage of a wide former railroad ROW. Further north, a section was converted into Gemenskap Park, resulting in an awkward merging of the divided lanes.

They could have put a nice 4 lane freeway though there instead.

[hotdogPi]

They could have put a nice 4 lane freeway though there instead.

Adjacent 15th Avenue would be the one to upgrade, not 14th. It crosses the river, and it already has interchanges.

[HighwayStar]

They could have put a nice 4 lane freeway though there instead.

Adjacent 15th Avenue would be the one to upgrade, not 14th. It crosses the river, and it already has interchanges.

Even better, do both and have a 6 lane freeway with Texas U turn frontage roads.

[jakeroot]

They could have put a nice 4 lane freeway though there instead.

Adjacent 15th Avenue would be the one to upgrade, not 14th. It crosses the river, and it already has interchanges.

Even better, do both and have a 6 lane freeway with Texas U turn frontage roads.

15th was originally planned and partially built as a freeway (notice the interchanges south of the ship canal), but it was shot down alongside most other Seattle freeways in the 1970s.

There is not enough traffic in the area to warrant any free flow roadways.