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Commission backs parking, loading and car‑share changes to planning code
Summary
The Planning Commission recommended approval of Supervisor Peskin’s ordinance to revise off‑street parking and loading rules—encouraging car‑share, permitting space‑efficient parking like stackers by right, and allowing residential parking leasing within a quarter‑mile—after adding staff changes on tandem parking.
The Planning Commission voted to recommend approval of an ordinance sponsored by Supervisor Peskin that would change multiple planning-code provisions governing off-street parking and loading.
Planning staff described amendments that would reduce or eliminate minimum off-street parking requirements for certain residential uses (seniors, affordable housing, SROs), encourage space-efficient parking systems (valet lifts and stackers), and recognize car-share parking as a legitimate use in more districts. The draft would also allow required residential accessory parking spaces to be leased on a monthly basis to nearby residents within a roughly quarter-mile walking distance, intended to formalize an existing market practice and prevent commuter parking.
Commission debate focused on safety and usability of non‑independently accessible parking. Staff and ordinance supporters urged allowing space‑efficient systems by right to reduce building costs and preserve housing affordability. Commissioners and public commenters pressed for safeguards: that tandem arrangements be limited so that a resident can access their car without excessive inconvenience and that a limited number of tandem spaces be permitted where one car only needs to be moved to retrieve another.
On a motion incorporating staff changes and a further amendment permitting tandem arrangements where only one car must be moved to access another, the commission voted unanimously to recommend the ordinance with those modifications. Commissioners asked staff to coordinate with the Fire Department on practical constraints for stackers and with DBI on standards and enforcement.
Next steps: The Planning Commission’s recommendation will be transmitted to the Board of Supervisors for further action, and staff will refine draft code text and address technical questions (valet hours, fire‑sprinkler constraints for stackers) raised in public comment.
Sources: Staff presentation and public testimony at the April 10 Planning Commission meeting (Tom Radulovich and other Planning Department staff).
