PARK-ABOVE-PARKING DOWNTOWN: A SPATIAL-BASED IMPACT INVESTIGATION by LANBIN REN A DISSERTATION Presented to the Department of Landscape Architecture and the Graduate School of the University of Oregon in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy December 2012 DISSERTATION APPROVAL PAGE Student: Lanbin Ren Title: Park-above-Parking Downtown: A Spatial-Based Impact Investigation This dissertation has been accepted and approved in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of Landscape Architecture by: Mark Gillem Chairperson Deni Ruggeri Member Robert Ribe Member Yizhao Yang Outside Member and Kimberly Andrews Espy Vice President for Research & Innovation/Dean of the Graduate School Original approval signatures are on file with the University of Oregon Graduate School. Degree awarded December 2012 ii © 2012 Lanbin Ren iii DISSERTATION ABSTRACT Lanbin Ren Doctor of Philosophy Department of Landscape Architecture December 2012 Title: Park-above-Parking Downtown: A Spatial-Based Impact Investigation Parking and parks are both crucial to downtown economic development. Many studies have shown that downtown parks significantly contribute to increasing surrounding property values and attract residents, businesses and investment. Meanwhile, sufficient available parking promotes accessibility to downtown that also contributes to increasing tax revenue for local government. However, both downtown parks and parking raise problems. Many downtown parks have become places for drug dealing, shooting and vandalism since the decline of downtowns in the 1960s. At the same time, residents and visitors alike oftentimes complain about the lack of parking while in fact parking spaces occupy a large amount of land in downtown. Parks and parking also compete for space in downtown where land value is higher than the rest of the city. To address these issues, several cities have begun to address the relationship between parking and parks by placing them in one place: park on the ground level and parking underneath. This typology is defined as a park-above-parking project in this research. However, this phenomenon has received little scholarly attention. To justify the existing situation of park-above-parking and to contemplate future projects, this research provides a spatial- based investigation to discuss the empirical relationships between social cultural and political-economic impacts, design quality, and related policy-making processes based on iv four cases. A longitudinal study that traces the direct and indirect impacts of park-above- parking projects was conducted for each case through both qualitative and quantitative methods. This research provides a set of methods for the measurement of contributions of park-above-parking downtown, connections between park quality, social use and adjacent economic growth, recommendations for land use planning policy-making and guidelines for the design of park-above-parking projects. v CURRICULUM VITAE NAME OF AUTHOR: Lanbin Ren GRADUATE AND UNDERGRADUATE SCHOOLS ATTENDED: University of Oregon, Eugene University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio South China University of Technology, Guangzhou, China Chang An University, Xi’an, China DEGREES AWARDED: Doctor of Philosophy, Landscape Architecture, 2012, University of Oregon Master of Science in Architecture, Architecture, 2007, University of Cincinnati Master of Architecture, Architecture, 2005, South China University of Technology Bachelor of Architecture, Architecture, 2002, Chang An University AREAS OF SPECIAL INTEREST: Sustainability in urban design, open space and economic development, land use planning PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE: Architect, Architectural Design Institute of SCUT, 3 Threes GRANTS, AWARDS, AND HONORS: Design Excellence, Departmental Buildings in New Campus of South China University of Technology, the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development, /The Ministry of Education, China, 2008 The First Price, Problems and Solutions of Bio-architecture, National Competition for Scientific and Technological Works of Undergraduate Students, The Ministry of Education, China, 2001 vi SELECTED PUBLICATIONS: Ren, L. (2012). The Rise and Fall: A Typology of Historical Downtown Parks. Proceedings of EDRA 43 Emergent Placemaking EDRA41 Proceedings (pp.122-128). Presented at the Environmental Design Research Association, Seattle, WA: Environmental Design Research Association. Ren, L. (2012). Public Space and Community Safety: A Study of High-density Housing Planning. The Sixth China Urban Housing Conference Proceedings (pp.279- 287), Presented at the Sixth China Urban Housing Conference, Beijing, China: the Sixth China Urban Housing Conference. Gillem, M., & Ren, L. (2010). The Downtown Park: Integrating Open Space, Urban Infill, and Economic Development. Policy & Environment EDRA41 Proceedings (pp. 58–67). Presented at the Environmental Design Research Association, Washington D.C.: Environmental Design Research Association. vii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I wish to express sincere appreciation to my committee, Dr. Mark Gillem, Dr. Deni Ruggeri, Dr. Robert Ribe, and Dr. Yizhao Yang for their assistance in the preparation of this manuscript. Dr. Mark Gillem inspired me regarding the topic of downtown parks. He led me to Esther Short Park, downtown Vancouver Washington where I witnessed how a downtown park contributes to urban development. In the following five years, Dr. Gillem helped me develop the scope of this research. During my research, he provided me fundings on field trips, conferences and many other academic events. Dr. Robert Ribe helped me move forward on research especially on methodology. He sat down with me on a regular basis regarding methods development for this research. Dr. Deni Ruggeri provided in-depth comments on every draft. The revision of this dissertation could not have completed without his guidance. Dr. Yizhao Yang shared her expertise on land use planning with me and taught me how to efficiently write my dissertation. I am grateful for having them on my committee. I would also like to thank the faculty and students in the landscape architecture department who offered me thoughtful comments over the years. I would like to thank my and friends for their generous help on this long journey. Special thanks to Dr. Yan Yang and Ms. Wu for our long-time friendship. I also thank many friends who encouraged me to move forward step by step. Finally, I would like to thank my family. Much gratitude to my parents: Yutang Ren and Shulan Wang. They always believed in me and supported me. Dad, mom, I cannot thank you enough. Last but not least, I thank my new husband, Jon Penneman. I am so happy to be with him. I want to thank him for all his love, support, encouragement and dedication. Thank you all. viii To My Parents Yutang Ren Shulan Wang And My Husband Jon Penneman ix TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter Page I. INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................... 1 Background ............................................................................................................ 1 Park-above-Parking Projects .................................................................................. 2 Purpose ................................................................................................................... 6 Research Questions ................................................................................................ 6 Significance............................................................................................................ 7 Summary of Chapters ............................................................................................ 7 II. LITERATURE REVIEW ........................................................................................ 9 Introduction ............................................................................................................ 9 Methods.................................................................................................................. 10 Downtown .............................................................................................................. 11 Downtown Vitality................................................................................................. 12 Downtown Parks .................................................................................................... 14 The History of Downtown Parks ..................................................................... 14 The Social Struggle of Downtown Parks ......................................................... 15 The Design and Renovation of Downtown Parks ............................................ 16 The Economic Impact of Downtown Parks ..................................................... 18 The Proximate Principle ............................................................................ 19 Impact Area ................................................................................................ 22 Measuring the Economic Contributions of Parks ...................................... 23 Index Method .................................................................................................. 26 x Chapter Page Economic Benefits of Downtown Parks .................................................... 27 Downtown Parking ................................................................................................ 29 Off-Street Parking and Traffic Congestion