There are few things in life more frustrating than being unable to find a convenient parking space. Nobody likes having to park far away from their destination, whether they are making a quick trip to the grocery store or going to work. So how can you take steps to make this inconvenience a rare occurrence? Your best tool may be a parking study.

Studies are used to collect information on the capacity and use of existing parking facilities. They identify parking demand, the extent of the problem, and potential solutions. Parking studies may be restricted to a particular traffic generator or attraction, such as a store or a stadium, or they may encompass an entire region, such as a central business district.

Here is a simplified, step by step approach to getting your parking study up and running.

Define The Study Area. Once you’ve identified that a study is in order, your first step is to define the study area. Using your central business district as an example, you should include downtown businesses plus a block or two around them so that perimeter parking and commuter patterns are covered. Take a look at your aerial photo or map and see if your limits make sense. Are all surface lots and garages covered? Are there areas of future redevelopment that should be included? Once the study area is mapped, number the blocks for ease of reference and to help with data collection.

Conduct a Parking Inventory by counting and mapping your on- and off-street parking spaces, both public and private. You can count the spaces or use a measuring wheel to estimate the spaces available. In parking lots that have no pavement markings, estimate the number of spaces available, omitting parking aisles and turn-arounds.

This inventory is an important step, so take your time. Then tabulate the data and transfer it to your study area map.

Collect Other Pertinent Data. Who owns the off-street facilities? What are the daily and hourly parking rates? Are there parking restrictions, such as 2-hour parking? You should also note the location of bus stops, cross walks, and truck and special delivery needs. This data will come into play later in the study.

Identify Peak Parking Times. Before you go out and start counting cars, you will need to figure out when is the best time to do so. If you’re getting complaints about the lack of weekday parking, count during the week. Omit Mondays and Fridays, as commuters like to take long weekends. Perhaps you’ve identified that Saturday or special event parking is the problem. If so, you’ll want to include these days in your study too.

In general, count occupied parking spaces for 2 hours, three times a day - during morning, lunchtime, and afternoon peak use periods. After hour, special-event data may require evening counts instead or in addition to those noted.

Count Occupied Spaces. This sounds easy but can get tricky. Remember, the goal is to identify the peak number of parked cars within the time frame designated. Once you count the number of cars in a parking lot at the start of your 2-hour time frame, you’ll have to account for vehicles entering and leaving. These are added to or subtracted from your initial number.

The results are then tabulated and percent occupancy is calculated. Based on your count, you may identify, for example, that Block 1, Parking Lot A is 62% full during the noon hour and 22% full in the morning. Understanding these patterns will help you determine where there is a problem and what the potential solutions may be.

Analyze Your Data. It’s helpful to report data both by time of day and street segment. Reporting occupancy by block, in tabular format or visually on your study map, is another great way to collate your results. You may find that certain downtown areas have full capacity during lunch and others are at capacity on Saturday night. You may see that on-street parking is at a premium, while a surface lot a block away is not.

Now that you actually know what is going on with your parking, you’re in a much better position to take targeted steps to improve the situation.

For more information on how to initiate a parking study and evaluate the results, contact Lorenzo Rotoli, P.E., PTOE. at 585-334-1310, x245 or LRotoli@fisherassoc.com