Australia may increase standard car parking spaces to fit the tanks

[warthog1]

Another advantage of the Swift. Short and narrow. Parking is easy and there is always room to open the door.

[familyguy]

As for who enforces it and penalises if it's not as per standard, that's anyones guess. So guess who takes the risk on classification and never seems to lose?

Mmmmm, interesting. According to the standard, shopping centre parkings should be classified as 3A.

...

I would suggest that the average parking bay is probably closer to 2.4m wide, and some are probably under 2.3m wide. My wife has a little i30 and she weighs 48kg, and she regularly complains about having space to open the door at our smaller suburban centre, and the small centre where our doctor is.

Agreed, they should be 3A. But usually seem to be classed as 2 , so only 2.4m wide. Take away paint and you're closer to 2.3m. Hence my point about enforcement and lack thereof.

[P!N20]

Hence my point about enforcement and lack thereof.

Nothing a traffic engineer's report can't fix.

[DavidS]

Went to Prahran Market today, a big Ranger was parked in the car park - it stuck out miles and it was parked right in the parking bay. I can get the falcon wagon into a parking bay fine, those things are ridiculous. If you want an urban assault vehicle you should need a special licence and pay more for compulsory third party insurance . . . they are absurd those vehicles.

Need to discourage these things on urban roads.

DS

[rkelsen]

they are absurd those vehicles.

Yep.

Why did the good old Aussie 6 cylinder sedan have to go away?

[g-boaf]

they are absurd those vehicles.

Yep.

Why did the good old Aussie 6 cylinder sedan have to go away?

Because everyone decided they didn’t want to drive “taxis” (the common social media outcry) so instead everyone went and got taxis with more prestigious badges, like BMW, Merc or Audi…

I did see an Audi Q7 taxi the other day in Sydney, so if you have a Q7, you’d better sell it quick smart, the prestige status just dropped! Cringe…

Of course there are different excuses, but in the older days if people needed something for carrying more people they got a people mover, not a hulking behemoth SUV.

[warthog1]

I do not see the point of using a 4wd twincab ute as a city bound commuter.
However I will make the point that when I got the Y61 patrol I still have, we also had an EB falcon wagon parked beside it in our carport. The falcon wagon is a longer car.

[brumby33]

I do not see the point of using a 4wd twincab ute as a city bound commuter.
However I will make the point that when I got the Y61 patrol I still have, we also had an EB falcon wagon parked beside it in our carport. The falcon wagon is a longer car.

Yeah Warty, the falcon wagon is built upon a Fairlane chassis that why they ride a lot nicer than a standard car due to the longer wheelbase. Didn't know they were longer than a Nissan Patrol though.

brumby33

[opik_bidin]

a comment on FB, from the bicycle NSW post about this

increasing the size of parking spaces (the proposal is to increase length by 20cm, no change to width) will reduce the capacity of parking lots and on street parking. There’s no winners in this.

For example, development control plans usually specify a ratio of parking spaces to floor area in commercial developments. You also have a ratio of building area to lot size, and height limits. I know of an office building development that’s recently been approved with 11 floors, 3 of which are for car parking with a total of 56 spaces.

27% of the building taken up to provide 7 spaces per habitable floor. Thats bad but longer spaces might not be possible in that floor plan. If the standard is changed not only do you have to increase the bay length, you have to increase the space between rows to accomodate manoeuvres for longer vehicles.

I’ve had people say “it’s just 20cm”, go through a carpark and add that to every row of parking plus another 20 to manoeuvre in and out of them. In a shopping centre or commuter carpark it adds metres you don’t have. On a street councils lose revenue as the number of metered spaces is reduced, all while maintenance costs are increased due to heavier vehicles. Retailers lose out because on a given length of road there’s fewer customers.

There is zero benefit to encouraging this kind of vehicle by catering to them.

[fat and old]

Todays Age

https://www.theage.com.au/politics/fede ... 5ee5v.html

On the carparking issue, it states

A current parking space should be 5.4 metres long. Standards Australia wants to increase that by 20 centimetres. Though the difference in length may only seem trivial, in real terms it would increase the size by roughly 4 per cent. At a shopping centre like Fountain Gate in Melbourne’s south-east, that would mean losing around 255 existing spaces to make way for these new vehicles.

On the link above, I gotta love BNSW's form.

Retailers lose out because on a given length of road there’s fewer customers.

Commmmmmme Onnnnnnnn Aren't the Cycling advocates continually pointing to reviews and studies that show less carspaces on a strip means more custom, made up of walkers and cyclists? You can't have it both ways.

[bychosis]

Making larger car parking spaces because vehicles are larger seems like a bad idea. Induced demand is a very real thing when building roads, it’ll make a difference in car parking too. You don’t see large cars in European cities for a reason.

Ultimately I suspect the only places you’d realistically see larger park bf spaces is in the other burbs where they really cater for car culture. Not so much in inner city areas where having a smaller car is just more sensible.

We’ve had decades of building cities to suit cars. Time to turn that around and build cities for people.

Note, I do own a twin cab ute (not a yank truck) and have no trouble parking it - but I’m not in a high density urban area either.

[Cyclophiliac]

Making larger car parking spaces because vehicles are larger seems like a bad idea. Induced demand is a very real thing when building roads, it’ll make a difference in car parking too. You don’t see large cars in European cities for a reason.

Ultimately I suspect the only places you’d realistically see larger park bf spaces is in the other burbs where they really cater for car culture. Not so much in inner city areas where having a smaller car is just more sensible.

We’ve had decades of building cities to suit cars. Time to turn that around and build cities for people.

Note, I do own a twin cab ute (not a yank truck) and have no trouble parking it - but I’m not in a high density urban area either.

Agreed. I mentioned the induced demand effect halfway through page 1 of this thread. We do need to stop changing things to suit car use, and do more to discourage car use (and use of oversized cars).

[Andy01]

Went to Prahran Market today, a big Ranger was parked in the car park - it stuck out miles and it was parked right in the parking bay. I can get the falcon wagon into a parking bay fine, those things are ridiculous. If you want an urban assault vehicle you should need a special licence and pay more for compulsory third party insurance . . . they are absurd those vehicles.

Need to discourage these things on urban roads.

DS

There actually isn't a lot in it (except height of course) - about 300mm longer (which is VERY long - the Falcon wagon was like a hearse)

Ford Falcon wagon - 5077 x 1871 x 1530mm
Ford Ranger - 5370 x 1918 x 1884mm

The Aussie six, and especially the wagons were crazy big compared to most of the current (affordable) cars and smaller SUVs. The biggest problem I had with them was that 15-20 years ago every school leaver (male) in cities wanted a Falcon or Commodore, but couldn't really afford a decent one, so they invariably ended up with aging beaten up $hit-boxes (ex taxis and fleet or hire cars) with shot suspension and dodgy brakes, and bad tyres after a few burn-outs, and the engine power didn't match the driver skills and road-holding. They were death traps in the hands of many P platers.

I wouldn't want either Aussie six or double cab if I got it for nothing.

[g-boaf]

Went to Prahran Market today, a big Ranger was parked in the car park - it stuck out miles and it was parked right in the parking bay. I can get the falcon wagon into a parking bay fine, those things are ridiculous. If you want an urban assault vehicle you should need a special licence and pay more for compulsory third party insurance . . . they are absurd those vehicles.

Need to discourage these things on urban roads.

DS

There actually isn't a lot in it (except height of course) - about 300mm longer (which is VERY long - the Falcon wagon was like a hearse)

Ford Falcon wagon - 5077 x 1871 x 1530mm
Ford Ranger - 5370 x 1918 x 1884mm

The Aussie six, and especially the wagons were crazy big compared to most of the current (affordable) cars and smaller SUVs. The biggest problem I had with them was that 15-20 years ago every school leaver (male) in cities wanted a Falcon or Commodore, but couldn't really afford a decent one, so they invariably ended up with aging beaten up $hit-boxes (ex taxis and fleet or hire cars) with shot suspension and dodgy brakes, and bad tyres after a few burn-outs, and the engine power didn't match the driver skills and road-holding. They were death traps in the hands of many P platers.

I wouldn't want either Aussie six or double cab if I got it for nothing.

Just note that taxis can mean old big mileage Audi Q7, which I saw the other day. Or Lexus, Hyundai, Kia, Tesla model 3, etc. all of the so called trendy cars…

Nobody seems worried about beat up old Silvias or grey import turbo Skylines which are equally death traps… one speeding Skyline did kill a poor innocent lady in another car when it slammed into her. They just tune them up to heck, do 400-500hp, barely adequate grip but the thing can do 150-180km/h with little effort, and that they do on Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights on the usual favourite public suburban roads. Groups of them get together and race each other.

But that’s fine, they aren’t in “bogan” cars… they’re just having a little fun…

The young hoon drivers I see now are all in foreign cars which are equally dangerous.

My Aussie six has very, very good handling… it has usual modern safety systems as well.

[Duck!]

It doesn't surprise me that some are suggesting making carparks bigger.

What does surprise me is that there is apparently a "standard" and that the suggested increase is length, not width.

I have an Outback and I weigh 64kg, so I don't require the door to be fully open to get in and out, which isn't huge but the number of times I see carparks that are so ridiculously narrow that I would struggle get out of the car. Other places (even in the same shopping centre) have carparks that are perfectly adequate - I am yet to see any evidence of an (enforced) standard.

It seems that often shopping centre management just paint the lines a bit closer to jam in a few extra spaces - a bit like budget airline seats.

The AS2890 series covers it all. Enlightening reading. Usage categories determine minimum width and length of spaces related each, wheel stops, overhangs, ramps, etc. AS/NZS2890.1:2004 is the one you want to find.

As for shopping centres, their usage category should give the widest space dimension, unless someone plays a bit fast and loose and categorises them differently. Immediately save 100mm width per space. Over the run of 25 spaces that's an additional car. Multiply that by 50 or 100 for a big centre and you're gaining cars at a great rate. As for who enforces it and penalises if it's not as per standard, that's anyones guess. So guess who takes the risk on classification and never seems to lose?

Another 200mm length and 100mm width minimum is probably needed.

Mmmmm, interesting. According to the standard, shopping centre parkings should be classified as 3A.

Parkings at 90°designated 3A should be 2.6m wide and 5.4m long. I call BS on every shopping centre I have visited in Brisbane/Gold Coast etc in the last 20 years.

Scenario - 3 parking bays each with a Subaru Outback (decent sized car at 4870L x 1875W) parking exactly in the middle of the parking space. The centre car should have 725mm between its mirrors and the mirrors of the car on each side, or 960mm door to door (I have just measured mine in the garage) - almost a full metre between cars - never happens.....

Out of curiosity after reading this thread, I measured a parking space an my local stupormarket in suburban Melbourne.... Inside the lines, 4750 x 2450mm. "Standard" my @r$e!!

My older ('99) model Outback doesn't fit in lengthwise (towbar pushes it well outside, but even without the bar it's marginal), but width is OK, mainly because at that time Japan heavily taxed vehicles more than 1700mm wide, so to stay inside that tax penalty it is a relatively narrow car.

[familyguy]

Out of curiosity after reading this thread, I measured a parking space an my local stupormarket in suburban Melbourne.... Inside the lines, 4750 x 2450mm. "Standard" my @r$e!!

The 2450mm is fine. But 4750mm length? That's laughably substandard. Almost complaint-worthy substandard. Even asking the facility manager or owner 'will your insurance really cover this if someone damages my car, fine print on entry signage or not' worthy. Wasn't marked as "SMALL CAR SPACE" which is a catch-all for "we can shoehorn one more in here, boss..." ?

[bychosis]

Out of curiosity after reading this thread, I measured a parking space an my local stupormarket in suburban Melbourne.... Inside the lines, 4750 x 2450mm. "Standard" my @r$e!!

I think it’s more usual to measure centre to centre between lines. You can measure from left side to left side too, it’s the same but easier than guessing the centre.

As for the length, unless it’s parallel parking alongside the road the actual length of the line is less important than the space available. I’d imagine the space was designed to suit standard length plus aisle width. Could argue that if the line is a bit shorter it may encourage cars to get closer to the other end of the space. Also if you’ve got hundreds of spaces to mark shorting by a couple hundred mm on each one would save a few coins in line marking, paid per metre normally.

Where cars are parking parallel to the roadway and parking node to tail it’s more critical to get the length of the space right to allow for entry and exit.

[fat and old]

I don’t think people realise just how many short parking spaces are around. There are many, many 5.4-5.6m long bays in the COM. Not by mistake, by design. Most every street in the CBD big and little have them,

[Mr Purple]

Saw a highlight in Facebook comments regarding the bigger parking spaces today.

'They're too small because they're designed by hipster cyclists'.

That's a new stretch. Blaming cyclists for the fact that the car spaces are too small!

I sort of enjoy comments like that, it means we're living rent free in their heads and are somehow responsible for all the ills of the world.

[g-boaf]

Saw a highlight in Facebook comments regarding the bigger parking spaces today.

'They're too small because they're designed by hipster cyclists'.

That's a new stretch. Blaming cyclists for the fact that the car spaces are too small!

I sort of enjoy comments like that, it means we're living rent free in their heads and are somehow responsible for all the ills of the world.

Might also have been written by a cyclist. Some of them like to play devils advocate too.

[Andy01]

Saw a highlight in Facebook comments regarding the bigger parking spaces today.

'They're too small because they're designed by hipster cyclists'.

That's a new stretch. Blaming cyclists for the fact that the car spaces are too small!

I sort of enjoy comments like that, it means we're living rent free in their heads and are somehow responsible for all the ills of the world.

If you are a glass-half-full person you might think that it is complimenting cyclists for being slim & trim and not needing fling the car doors wide open like the overweight & obese majority (about 65% I think I read somewhere) to enter or exit a car - but I doubt it was intended as a compliment