[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
.Any of the following examples, therefore, wouldqualify as acceptable under the law: eliminating parking subsidies, pro-viding parking subsidies only for carpools, offering a choice between aparking subsidy and its cash value, or offering a commuting allowancethat can be spent on any form of commuting (Shoup, 1997).Despite this legislation s potential benefits, California has notrequired qualifying firms to comply with the cash-out law.Initially,some uncertainty surrounded the federal income-tax consequences ofcashing out parking subsidies, but this ambiguity was subsequentlyresolved with the Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997 (P.L.105-34).With thischange in federal legislation, the state can now enforce the cash-outlaw, but, to date, it has not taken the steps to do so.While the originallegislation granted ARB the authority to implement cash-out, the lawdoes not require that ARB conduct any type of outreach or monitoring.Such activities are entirely at ARB s discretion and, to date, have notreceived significant funding.In addition, the law contains no reportingrequirements for businesses, making it virtually impossible for ARB toassess or monitor compliance.ARB has published and made availablea 10-page guide to the parking cash-out law, providing informationabout who is subject to the law and how to implement cash-out pro-grams.Otherwise, ARB has conducted little outreach to make employ-ers aware of the program, and statewide data on the effectiveness ofparking cash-out are simply not available (Long, 2002).The primary goal of this strategy, then, would be to enforce the lawthat already exists.With additional funding provided at the state level,ARB could certainly achieve that.Alternatively, local jurisdictionssuch as AQMD or individual municipalities could take it uponthemselves to implement regulations or legislation mirroring the exist-ing state law. 418 Moving Los Angeles: Short-Term Policy Options for Improving TransportationEvaluation of StrategyCost/Revenue ImplicationsRating: Low cost.From the public-sector perspective, implement-ing parking cash-out regulations entails minor administrative costs.Forexample, the City of Santa Monica has instituted a local parking cash-out law for which the annual cost of administration is about $250,000(Long, 2002).On the other hand, parking cash-out increases federaland state income-tax revenues by an estimated $65 per employee atparticipating firms, a result stemming from the fact that employer-paidparking benefits are tax-exempt, while parking cash-out benefits arenot (Shoup, 1997).Though the cost/revenue assessment focuses on the public sector,parking cash-out programs also impose relatively minor costs on par-ticipating firms.For employees who formerly drove to work and chooseto accept the cash-out option instead, there is no net cost to the firms(in that the money saved on parking leases is equal to the amount pro-vided as cash-out to such employees).When employers offer parkingcash-out to employees who drive, however, they must also provide thesame cash-out payment to employees who already relied on alternativetransportation modes before the program was initiated.This raises thenet cost of the program, but the added cost is usually minor in largepart because the percentage of drivers who choose not to drive whenparking is provided for free is typically quite low.In a study of severalfirms that had recently implemented parking cash-out, Shoup (1997)estimated that the average net cost to employers (parking cash-out pay-ments minus parking-lease savings) equaled about $2 per employee permonth.In addition, firms are likely to face some administrative costsassociated with parking cash-out programs.Short-Term Effectiveness in Reducing CongestionRating: Low.In the short term, aggressive enforcement of thestate s existing parking cash-out law (or, alternatively, implementationof comparable regulations at the local level) would likely lead to modestreductions in traffic congestion.While available evidence suggests thatparking cash-out programs are extremely effective in reducing the share Parking Cash-Out 419of workers who drive alone, only a small percentage of firms meet all ofthe criteria that would require them to offer cash-out to their employ-ees.This limits the potential of parking cash-out as a strategy for reduc-ing congestion in the short term.The evidence that parking cash-out, where implemented, pro-vides an effective incentive for employees to choose alternative modesof transportation is quite compelling.Shoup (1995) summarized theresults of seven studies that compared commuting behavior either(1) before and after employer-paid parking was eliminated or (2) formatched samples of commuters with and without employer-paid park-ing.On average, the number of cars driven to work at firms that offeredfree parking was 72 per 100 employees.At firms that did not offer freeparking, the number was only 53 cars per 100 employees, a 26-percentreduction.In a follow-up study, Shoup (1997) examined the results for eightemployers in the L.A
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]