I’m fascinated by the modalities of owning a car in NYC. I’ve read that most people don’t have assigned parking spaces and use garages, which often have 24-hr waits for accessing one’s vehicle since a valet needs time to get it out of a tightly packed space. This is backed up by multiple sources \[1\]\[2\].
I’m figuring, a hypothetical garage that let people self-park whenever they want would command a price premium for the convenience, and save on the staffing costs of valets. How is it that such a garage doesn’t come into existence and put the valet-only garages out of business?
\[1\] [https://jalopnik.com/owning-a-car-in-new-york-is-absolutely-worth-it-1782352176](https://jalopnik.com/owning-a-car-in-new-york-is-absolutely-worth-it-1782352176)\[2\] SpotHero’s guide to NYC parking – link omitted since it has a chance of triggering a spam filter
Edit: It looks like the point about taking 24 hrs to retrieve a car is out-of-date – it’s more like 30 mins.
In: Economics
Land in NYC is extremely expensive. A self serve garage would require valuable garage space to be left clear for routes to drive in and out of every single spot. A valet garage can carry double/triple parked which allows more the floor space to be used for parking and less for unobstructed paths. A self serve garage would have to charge a parking fee 1.5x higher than a valet garage in order to be able to exist. They’re definitely not going to put everyone out of business by charging so much more.
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