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Comment by seanmcdirmid | Hacker News Reader

Price parking appropriately and make people pay for it. If land is cheap, parking is cheap, so not a big deal. If land is expensive, then no freeloading on the streets, which can be put to better use anyways (sidewalks, bike lanes, outdoor cafes etc...)

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What do you mean freeloading? Do you know how many taxes do you pay to have a vehicle, gas, etc?

The car registration and gas taxes don't even pay for a quarter of all road-infrastructure-related costs. It boggles the mind to see free street parking in places like NYC, where a more reasonable cost structure would be something like other cities around the world (and Canada) do: divide the territory in parking districts. Locals can buy a discounted annual pass for the district where their main residence is located (should not cost less than $400/month in a place like Manhattan), while elsewhere the rate should be at least $10-12/hour.

You're leaving your property on public land. How much would that land rent for?

You perhaps pay tens of dollars per month. Is that enough to fully cover all externalized costs of owning that vehicle? No.

The government says yes. In fact, knowing the government, they probably get a huge surplus from my taxes. What makes you say no?

You should look up how your local government pays for the kinds of local roads you can park on.

If you live in the US, there's a very good chance that's coming from the property and sales tax everyone pays, not any tax on your vehicle.

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