Marking Streets to Improve Parking Density

TL;DR

This paper investigates behavioral interventions like educational campaigns and street markings to improve parking density in urban environments, finding that painted lines roughly twice the length of average cars optimize space utilization.

Contribution

It introduces and compares two interventions—educational campaigns and street markings—to enhance parking density, with simulation evidence favoring painted lines for better behavior.

Findings

Painted lines roughly twice car length maximize density

Visual cues from lines improve parking behavior

Educational campaigns are more effective if compliance is high

Abstract

Street parking spots for automobiles are a scarce commodity in most urban environments. The heterogeneity of car sizes makes it inefficient to rigidly define fixed-sized spots. Instead, unmarked streets in cities like New York leave placement decisions to individual drivers, who have no direct incentive to maximize street utilization. In this paper, we explore the effectiveness of two different behavioral interventions designed to encourage better parking, namely (1) educational campaigns to encourage parkers to "kiss the bumper" and reduce the distance between themselves and their neighbors, or (2) painting appropriately-spaced markings on the street and urging drivers to "hit the line". Through analysis and simulation, we establish that the greatest densities are achieved when lines are painted to create spots roughly twice the length of average-sized cars. Kiss-the-bumper campaigns are in principle more effective than hit-the-line for equal degrees of compliance, although we believe that the visual cues of painted lines induce better parking behavior.