A research project on Los Angeles’ parking minimums received the American Planning Association Los Angeles’ 2020 award for academic excellence for work conducted as part of master’s capstone project.

Titled “Parking? Lots! Parking Over the Minimum in Los Angeles,” Katelyn Stangl MURP ‘19 explored developer responses to parking minimums in the city. Critics of parking minimums often say they require developers to build an excess of parking because the minimums are calculated in response to peak demand needs. In order to help pave the way for parking minimum reform, Stangl set out to investigate why a developer would build over parking minimums.

Among Stangl’s findings were:

• Developments with the largest parking reductions built less parking overall but more relative to their reduced parking minimums.
• Developers also tend to provide extra parking in dense areas where people are more likely to ride transit or travel by foot.
• The main reasons developers build more parking is due to perceived market demand, financial pressure, or community opposition.

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Among the other APA Los Angeles award recipients were the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs with the landmark award to mark 50 years of UCLA’s urban planning department and its contributions to the Los Angeles community, and the UCLA Lewis Center for Regional Policy Studies, as part of the team that advised LA Metro’s “Understanding How Women Travel” report.

View the full list of APA Los Angeles award winners