I think you misunderstood “parking minimums”. It has nothing to do with the government giving you free parking.

You see, many cities in the US used to require that if you put up a building, you had to provide a certain number of parking spaces as part of its construction. (The spaces don’t have to be free.) That way people living or shopping at that building would have a place to put their car.

Urbanists have fallen for developer lobbyists who want to get rid of parking spaces so that they have more space to rent and can make more money. In turn, some cities have decided to do away with “parking minimum” regulations. And as a result, more people will have to park on the street because there is no longer a mandate to provide parking as part of a development. This means less space for sidewalks and bike lanes.

Urbanists believe that Americans will magically get rid of their cars and take public transportation, walk, or bike everywhere. Nevermind that public transport is a joke in most places in the US and climate change means it’s 105 degrees outside. They also believe that increasing rental space by getting rid of parking will drive down rental prices. We’ll see.

So we’ve gone from one extreme (massive empty parking lots) to another (nowhere to park but the street).

Personally I don’t mind parking lots or garages if they are done correctly. But there’s no mandate to plant a tree every five spaces, or put vines on the sides of parking garages, or simply lower the minimum number of spaces to something reasonable. Instead, we’re just going to sacrifice our potential green space entirely to more rental space.