Is 'smart growth' smart when the infrastructure hasn't caught up?

I'm generally a fan of the idea behind smart growth. That is, instead of continuing to build out, creating sprawl, traffic congestion, and more blacktop, build up, in the city near public transportation.


There are, however, two problems with the smart growth approach. The first has to do with the capacity of urban infrastructure to absorb all these new people. The second has to do with elitism. I'll cover the infrastructure angle today and the affordability one in a later post this week.

I started thinking about the smart growth concept last week when I saw that WMTA has received a new proposal from local developers (EYA) for space adjacent to the Takoma Park metro station. Right now the space is taken up by the kiss and ride, a surface parking lot, and a green space. Here's a current map of the space (be sure to scroll down).

Efforts to develop the site, owned by WMTA, have been going on for nearly a decade. The new plan still has opposition in the neighborhood (which straddles the border between Maryland and DC and the two Takomas--Takoma Park, MD and Takoma DC). But, the smart growth advocates in the area are getting behind it. The plan, which you can see here, proposes a building with around 200 apartments. The building will be built on the parking lot and over top of the kiss and ride.  The green space will be left intact.    

Smart growth advocates are especially happy with the development because it has fewer parking spaces than an earlier proposal for the site, which included townhouses with 2 car garages.  The new development will include about .7 spaces per unit.  Critics of the first townhouse plan thought 2 car garages next to a metro station was, well, ridiculous. Isn't the whole point of living next to metro, they reasoned, to not have to use cars?

So, what's wrong with this picture?  On the face of it nothing.  But, according to several sources, smart growth advocates would like to lower the number of spaces per unit to below .7 parking spaces.  As Greater Greater Washington argues: "Like with any proposal, there is room for more improvement. The proposal offers much less parking for residents than before, which makes sense for a site next to a Metro station. But it could be lower still, since this is the transit agency's land and the point is to build housing for more transit customers."

Taking metro instead of driving is great in theory.  But, anyone who has ever had to rely on the metro's red line knows how scream-inducingtrying that can be. The red line is not only the busiest line in the system, but also the most problem-laden.  And, it's not much better on the weekend when single tracking can double commute times.

Let's also keep in mind that when people couple up in this region, they often work on opposite ends of the city/region, meaning that even if one one person can hop on the metro the other can't use metro to get to work.  Hello car, you don't look like Satan anymore.    

So, cutting parking spaces in this new development just seems naive.  Sure, we'd all like to live near a metro station and never have to drive in DC traffic.  But, until the infrastructure permits it, even some people near metro will need cars.   

I want to support smart growth, but sometimes their sheer lack of pragmatism is off-putting, more preachy and smug than aware of how people actually live.