ABSTRACT
In practice, the in-lieu fees give developers an alternative to providing expensive on-site parking spaces, and the shared public parking gives downtown the park-once advantages of shopping malls. Until 1994, Beverly Hills calculated an in-lieu fee for each project based on the estimated cost per space to build a public parking structure nearby. The in-lieu fee is thus the share of the total cost of a public parking space that parkers do not pay. Because the in-lieu fees are based only on capital costs, the parking impact fees underestimate the total cost that parking requirements impose on development. The city then uses the fee revenue to provide public parking spaces. The in-lieu fees also serve another important purpose: they reveal the high cost of the parking requirements themselves. Minimum parking requirements impose no burden if developers would voluntarily provide the required number of parking spaces.
