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Council lowers parking minimum for studios and one-bedrooms to one space per unit
Summary
The council amended Chapter 26 to change parking requirements for studio and one-bedroom units from roughly 2+ spaces per unit to a standard of one space per studio/one-bedroom (with visitor parking rules retained), to help reduce development costs and encourage affordability.
The Cedar Falls City Council voted Oct. 6 to amend Chapter 26 of the zoning code to reduce off-street parking minimums for studio and one-bedroom apartments in multiunit buildings to one parking space per unit.
Planning staff presented background showing Cedar Falls’ current requirement produces among the highest parking-per-unit requirements in comparable Iowa cities. Under the current standard, studios and one-bedroom units are treated on a per-bedroom basis that produces about 2.2 parking spaces per unit for studios and one-bedroom units. Staff supplied a comparison across Iowa cities and said many communities require one space per studio unit; Urbandale and Waukee were cited as recent local examples with lower requirements.
Staff also showed how the change would affect an approved development: the 195-unit Cedar West Apartments (a mix of studio, one- and two-bedroom units) currently calculates to 428 required parking spaces under the old standard; the proposed change would reduce that requirement to 353 spaces for that development, saving roughly 18,000 square feet of pavement compared with the existing requirement. Staff emphasized that developers often build more parking than the ordinance minimum and that the amendment aims to reduce unnecessary building costs and promote affordable units.
Councilors asked technical questions about definitions (the code does not specify a studio square-foot cap; a one-bedroom is distinguished by a separate room with a door), visitor parking and whether employee-parking requirements elsewhere in the code were preserved or relocated; staff said some language was reorganized and one employee-parking requirement was removed as part of the cleanup.
Some councilors proposed exploring a square-footage-based standard (for example, different requirements for studios under a size threshold), and a councilor asked staff to take further study to Planning & Zoning if the council preferred a different approach. After discussion, the council approved the ordinance changing the parking minimum to one space per studio/one-bedroom unit and made other wording cleanups; Planning & Zoning had recommended approval 7–0.
