Mostaque Demra
Public space
'Why should the non-car-owning majority allow the car-owning minority to store their private property, i.e. cars, on public property at no charge? Why should my every walk to the store be akin to a stroll through a parking lot? Why should that majority be subject to the many costs and risks to health and safety attendant on the private car?' -"The Ethicist", a weekly column in the New York Times Magazine (July 27, 2003)
The problem of parking is a typical 'commons problem'. Land belongs to the community and is freely available to everyone. While this sounds like a good thing, common ownership and use leads to misuse, and as a result, everyone suffers. When land for grazing is available to all, the land is quickly over-grazed, and soon if of no use to anyone. Common ownership only works when access is limited to a few people. For each individual, grazing their animal on community land for free is a benefit; when everyone does it, the whole community suffers. In the same sense, what works for an individual driver-parking free wherever he wishes-is destructive for the community as a whole.
Off-street parking is seen as the appropriate remedy to reduce traffic, since it would presumably decrease the number of cars parked on footpaths and streets. However, by providing more parking, traffic increases both locally and regionally. Market-priced curb parking, in contrast, decreases traffic congestion both locally and regionally.
Residents have no innate right to park free at curbs; we can't leave our private goods (beds, etc.) on the street, so why can people leave their cars? Public space is for public use, not for the individual, private benefit of a few drivers.
In the US, curb parking is free because drivers resist paying for it, and they vote. The situation is somewhat different in Dhaka; a combination of ignorance about the problems of parking, and eagerness to serve the elite, lead to policies that in the end will only increase traffic congestion, thus harming drivers as well as everyone else.
Free parking can be compared to free desserts. Imagine if all restaurants were required to provide a free dessert with every meal! Restaurant owners would simply raise the price of the meal to include the dessert, whether or not the diner chose to eat it.
Those who do eat the desserts would become overweight and more likely to suffer from diabetes, and those who didn't would find their meals becoming more expensive since they are paying for the 'free' desserts of others. Free parking, like free desserts, are a bad deal for everyone, however appealing they may look on the surface.