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"Fight the towers! Or kiss your car park goodbye": How often do residents assert car parking rights in Melbourne planning appeals?

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  • Elizabeth Taylor

Abstract

At around 20 square metres per space and occupying over 30% of the ground area of many cities, car parking is an expected but unnoticed land use - pulling the proverbial devil's trick of "convincing the world it doesn't exist". Recent poster slogans in Melbourne calling to "fight the towers! Or kiss your car park goodbye" imply that frustration over a lack or perceived future lack of parking space carries weight in planning conflicts over intensifying Australian cities. The research in this paper was motivated by a suspicion that fears expressed by existing residents about parking are a frequent and prominent but rarely examined planning issue in Victoria. The paper interprets residents' claims made about inadequate parking as conflicts over asserted rights, and their allocation and reallocation through planning. It is based on a content analysis of four months (325 cases) of published Victorian planning appeals from 2012. It is found that over half the appeals featured car parking as a significant issue, and that of these, nine out of ten involved third party objectors. The planning system is called upon to respond to issues arising from car rather than land use, and to do so by making further allowances for cars. This asserted "folk legality" of individual car parking rights is difficult to reconcile with growing literature offering critical perspectives on aggregate costs from "predict and provide" car parking policies. Differences between public and planning interpretations of the role of planning in balancing car parking rights and common good are observed. Ultimately, conflict over asserted parking rights in planning draw out fundamental tensions around who - or what - has the right to occupy space.

Suggested Citation

  • Elizabeth Taylor, 2014. ""Fight the towers! Or kiss your car park goodbye": How often do residents assert car parking rights in Melbourne planning appeals?," Planning Theory & Practice, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 15(3), pages 328-348, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:rptpxx:v:15:y:2014:i:3:p:328-348
    DOI: 10.1080/14649357.2014.929727
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Commission, Productivity, 2011. "Performance Benchmarking of Australian Business Regulation: Planning, Zoning and Development Assessments," Research Reports, Productivity Commission, Government of Australia, volume 2, number 46.
    2. repec:ucp:bkecon:9781884829987 is not listed on IDEAS
    3. Chris Webster & Lawrence W.-C. Lai, 2003. "Property Rights, Planning and Markets," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 2625.
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Gössling, Stefan & Humpe, Andreas & Hologa, Rafael & Riach, Nils & Freytag, Tim, 2022. "Parking violations as an economic gamble for public space," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 116(C), pages 248-257.
    2. KW Chau & Lawrence WC Lai & Mark H Chua, 2022. "Post-colonial conservation of colonial built heritage in Hong Kong: A statistical analysis of historic building grading," Environment and Planning B, , vol. 49(2), pages 671-686, February.
    3. Scheiner, Joachim & Faust, Nico & Helmer, Johannes & Straub, Michael & Holz-Rau, Christian, 2020. "What's that garage for? Private parking and on-street parking in a high-density urban residential neighbourhood," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 85(C).
    4. Taylor, Dr Elizabeth, 2021. "Free parking for free people: German road laws and rights as constraints on local car parking management," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 101(C), pages 23-33.
    5. Crystal Legacy, 2017. "Transport planning in the urban age," Planning Theory & Practice, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 18(2), pages 177-180, April.
    6. De Gruyter, Chris & Truong, Long T. & Taylor, Elizabeth J., 2020. "Can high quality public transport support reduced car parking requirements for new residential apartments?," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 82(C).
    7. De Gruyter, Chris & Hooper, Paula & Foster, Sarah, 2023. "Do apartment residents have enough car parking? An empirical assessment of car parking adequacy in Australian cities," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 107(C).
    8. Edward C. H. Tang, 2021. "Speculate a lot," Pacific Economic Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 26(1), pages 91-109, February.
    9. Pivithuru Kalpana Nanayakkara & Nano Langenheim & Irene Moser & Marcus White, 2022. "Do Safe Bike Lanes Really Slow Down Cars? A Simulation-Based Approach to Investigate the Effect of Retrofitting Safe Cycling Lanes on Vehicular Traffic," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(7), pages 1-20, March.
    10. Taylor, Elizabeth Jean, 2020. "Parking policy: The politics and uneven use of residential parking space in Melbourne," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 91(C).

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