And yet, parking space is a highly personal and prized thing – right up there with soaker tubs and walk-in closets: you don’t really know how fantastic it is to have one until you’ve actually got one, and you certainly don’t realize just how much you take it for granted until it’s gone. If you had to place a value on the convenience derived from being free of the bitter task of scraping frost from your car’s windows on chilly mornings and the peace of mind that comes from knowing your four-wheeled baby is securely stored away from the scandalous acts of would-be vandals, you’d probably be hard pressed to come up with a dollar figure – but try this one on for size: $40,000.

That staggering sum is the average price of a single parking space in any high-rise condo in midtown Calgary, rolled (of course) into the listing price paid by you as the buyer. Now, if you’re like most people in the high-rise demographic (first time buyer in the infant stages of your career, driving a base model Chevrolet) the irony here is obvious: you’re paying more for the privilege of parking than you are for the vehicle to fill the space. Trouble is, going car free in a city like Calgary isn’t exactly an enticing option, even if you live centrally. This town is so vast that getting to where you might need to be in a timely fashion on any given day takes nothing less than your own set of wheels.

“There’s definitely a contradiction going on,” says Bruce McKenzie, Principal at Poon McKenzie Architects.  “On one hand, the city wants Calgarians, particularly those who live downtown to go car free, but on the other hand they give the go-ahead for more and more suburban development. With both of these initiatives happening at once, we have to come up with creative solutions that bridge the gap.”

A new City of Calgary Land Use Bylaw goes into effect next year. In it are painstakingly detailed rules that outline precisely how many parking spaces must be allotted per multi-family unit in various regions within city limits. The city standard ratio is 0.9 parking stalls for every unit developed, plus 0.15 stalls per unit designated for visitors; oddball numbers to the layperson, but nonetheless strictly policed by the city for compliance by all architects and developers.

“There’s a constant debate over what the right ratios are,” McKenzie says. “Parking gets more expensive the deeper you dig. In an urban setting where a developer has to go down three, four or more levels to meet the rules set out in the bylaw, the cost goes up incrementally; roughly $20,000 for the first level, $30,000 for the second and so on as you go on down. When the density of a project goes up, which is becoming more encouraged and increasingly popular the bigger Calgary gets, the more the cost of parking is borne by all the owners. It’s not a cost effective approach for the developer or the buyer. The challenge is how to address the discrepancy.”
The big question is this: are midtown Calgarians prepared to part ways with their two door sport coupes in favour of a pedestrian existence? Maybe – if public transit is given a facelift and other more customized solutions are implemented in developments around town.

“There are lots of creative solutions to consider,” says McKenzie. “Projects in Vancouver have implemented joint use vehicle programs where half a dozen smart cars or the like are purchased for the development; owners are able to sign up to use the cars for certain periods of time on certain days. Shuttle buses are another option – running to and from designated points around the city. And in Calgary, the +15 system is a potentially viable alternative. If we could connect high-rise developments to office buildings, for example, it would go a long way in promoting pedestrian living downtown. Of course the public transit system is a huge driver that developers have no control over. City Hall needs to expand existing transit facilities and come up with more options and convenient routes if they truly want fewer cars on the streets.”

Is the option to waive your parking space for a reduced price point ever going to be a reality in Calgary? It’s anyone’s guess. For now, parking is still the number one driver (no pun intended) behind every project on the drawing board.

“Everything we do architecturally is related to parking,” McKenzie says. “The number of units, the size of each unit – all of it. The bigger the building, the more parking that’s required, the higher the base price. It’s all connected.”