By Rupert Clayton, HANC Board
Early in 2016, the city is due to review the pilot program under which it has been allowing the car-sharing companies ZipCar, City CarShare and Getaround to rent on-street parking spaces. The program was set up in July 2013 to run until August 30, 2015, and it’s not entirely clear why the review did not take place earlier.
The original expectation was that up to 900 parking spaces across the city might be converted from a mix of metered and unmetered use to be dedicated to specific Car-Share Organizations (CSOs). In fact, by July 2015, the three approved CSOs had only taken up 203 spaces. The pilot program required each CSO vehicle using an on-street space to be available at least 75 percent of the time during any given month. This clause allowed members of the “peer-to-peer” network Getaround to get a dedicated on-street parking space for $150 per month in Zone 2 (which covers most of the Haight-Ashbury), and still drive their cars 42 hours a week. Car-share spaces get an exemption from street-cleaning restrictions so that companies don’t have to move their vehicles; in exchange, the companies are supposed to clean their rented spaces themselves, which some have done better than others.
One big concern early on was that CSOs would focus on serving downtown and high-rent neighborhoods and neglect outlying communities that already receive poorer service from Muni and other transport options. To combat this, the initial legislation split the city into three concentric zones radiating out from downtown, with annual permit costs dropping from $2,700 (Zone 1) through $1,800 (Zone 2) to $600 (Zone 3). The legislation required that “vehicles must be made available to members citywide with at least 15 percent located in Zone 2 and 15 percent in Zone 3”. The CSOs have just about met these minimums, requesting only 46 permits (23% of the total) for spaces in Zone 2 and 40 permits (20%) in Zone 3.
The pilot legislation permitted little public input on the siting of car-share spaces. In general, the locations are negotiated between the CSOs and the city’s project manager for the pilot who then presents blocks of sites for approval by the SFMTA board. There is no requirement to consider the many other demands on the use of curb space. Unsurprisingly, space along major streets in busy neighborhoods is being gobbled up by CSOs as well as tour-bus operators, street-safety measures, Muni bulb-outs, parklets and a myriad other uses. With no central coordination, each party views the curb as its own low-cost unlimited resource.
The pilot legislation did specify some reporting requirements, but these are mostly focused on demonstrating the scheme’s commercial success. This includes a report on the CSOs’ marketing campaigns so that the SFMTA can “review the effectiveness of these outreach efforts”; quarterly data on member numbers by ZIP code, vehicle locations, times and distances of car share trips, utilization rates, and number of users per vehicle; and two annual member surveys.
Missing from this reporting is any data on the effects of on-street car-sharing on neighborhoods. How can residents see if nearby car-share spots are really providing benefits? Does removing existing parking in commercial corridors impact businesses? Is it more equitable to share street space through metered short-term parking or by renting it to a CSO owned by Avis-Budget or a VC-funded startup?
HANC intends to push for any permanent on-street car share program to properly consider the many demands for curbside real estate. If you would like your views to be considered, please contact us via email (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..