(Photos: Jonathan Maus/BikePortland)
“I felt like I was eating a hamburger in 1906 and I just opened the book, The Jungle, by Upton Sinclair.”
That’s how Portlander Tony Jordan said he felt when he first read, The High Cost of Free Parking by Donald Shoup, a book that has had as much impact on Jordan’s life as it has had on the burgeoning auto parking reform movement. Jordan’s comments came at a backyard party Sunday night where he spoke to an eager crowd at the first-ever fundraiser for the nonprofit Parking Reform Network, which he co-founded in 2019.
“We’re all here because when we look at a new surface parking lot, or see a lot being dug up for an apartment’s underground garage, we understand these are just the surface expressions of a sinister force,” Jordan continued.
That sinister force is cars, which Jordan very capably painted as a monstrous force of evil when allowed to run amok in cities. “Every new structured parking space built is a generational commitment to the status quo of car dependency and the climate crisis. Car parking is fossil fuel infrastructure as much as building a new freeway or oil refinery,” he said.
Jordan himself is a force when it comes to parking reform activism. In 2015 he started Portland Shoupistas a group that connected parking activists and helped give him a platform to testify at City Hall on a number of issues. Along the way, Jordan has helped educate hundreds of Portland’s most influential insiders, elected officials, and policymakers (in 2017 Jordan wrote on BikePortland that even Mayor Ted Wheeler believes the parking versus housing debate is “really over”). As Jordan’s profile grew and he built legion of followers, his group evolved into Portlanders for Parking Reform. Now, with Parking Reform Network ready to spread its wings, he’s in charge of a national network of more than 180 members across the globe who want to take Shoup’s policy teachings to the next level.
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In his speech last night, Jordan explained why the time is right for PRN to grow:
“We’re at a point where it’s widely accepted in planning that expensive car parking mandates are bad policies. Cities are facing revenue shortfalls while half of their most valuable asset, the roads, are used to store personal property for free. But the obvious solutions aren’t implemented because too few organizations have a mission that allows them to give parking policy reform the focus it needs and deserves. The Parking Reform Network is here to inspire and support local and regional partner support groups, but also to provide materials, advice and assistance to professionals and activists in any field where parking is an obstacle.”
The organization wants to tackle two big projects: The first is a collaboration with Strong Towns to create a comprehensive map of all the U.S. cities that have eliminated the dastardly policy of minimum parking requirements. The second is a “digital playbook” on parking benefit districts (PBDs), a policy tool that uses parking revenue to invest in neighborhoods (learn more about them in this 2016 BikePortland story).
A fundraising site was set up over the weekend with a goal to raise $7,000 to help complete those projects. It was fully funded by Monday morning. It appears that Portland — and the nation — is eager to vanquish the parking monster once and for all.
You can donate, get involved or learn more at ParkingReform.org.
— Jonathan Maus: (503) 706-8804, @jonathan_maus on Twitter and jonathan@bikeportland.org
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Go team!
The “parking monster”
That seems a bit hyperbolic for anyone but those in the bike portland echo chamber.
I don’t know whether to point out that it’s a seasonally appropriate metaphor and therefore not technically hyperbolic or whether to point out that parking policy and overbuilding really is a literal disaster on many levels. And it might not be mainstream, but mostly that’s because few people have thought critically about it. I’ve found that upon honest examination, a whole lot of people actually do agree. That’s why we had great attendance for this event, which was invite only, and why we keep winning on policy here in town, I’m passionate about it and I’m not making shit up.
Well on the plus side of parking reform, one could ban (actually ban) vehicles longer than a f350 from parking on city streets within 300 feet of any residential home.
Just sayin…
Enforcement of that ban might be considered discrimination in Portland. We first would need to assess the demographic ownership of pickup trucks.
Or, we just treat everyone equally.
Sure. We can treat humans equally. But not their disastrous motorhomes.
Internalizing the cost of parking for residents of new developments is not “dastardly”.
What does this even mean?
It means that when a development adds a new parking burden to an area, it should not externalize that cost onto the community.
And I like saying “dastardly”.
I got it immediately. Tony seems immune to how his proposed ideas will negatively impact others.
One problem with overly-passionate people is that they do not make good analysts or listeners.
Interesting how my proposed ideas mostly are just asking for the negative impact of people’s transportation decisions to be borne by them, not everyone else.
Of course a driver would rather everyone else pay their way and will whine and cry when someone suggests that’s not fair (and a disaster for the environment and public health). I’m not immune at all to how that might impact people, I just know from data and experience that the people who cry the loudest about it are relatively wealthy ones who mostly enjoy the benefit of car subsidies.
I’m on the record plenty of places, including as a member of the POEM task force, in advocating for direct cash subsidies (pre-bates) for low income households to offset the impact of additional pricing. That is just one example of the ways I have listened and thought about how we can stop destroying the planet without putting the burden on the people most impacted by the mistakes we’ve already made.
***comment deleted by request of author***
Hi. I’m not a single parent (and am amazed at the strength of single parents!), but I do 90% of daycare/school drop offs, 90% of grocery shopping, and 50% of doctor visits, 90% of in-town adventures, and am a Shoupista. I certainly do have a bunch of privilege.
But: most of the carless households are in the poorest 20% of households. They’re subsidizing those who drive. And 30% or so of Oregonians cannot drive themselves – usually the poor, young, old, and people with disabilities. Homeowner households own 50% more cars than renter households. Men own more cars than women. White households own more cars that BIPOC households. Parking mandates are generally laws that benefit the privileged at the expense of those with less privilege.
The goal is to not to try in vain to provide limitless “free” parking, a fool’s errand which destroys neighborhoods, the climate, walkability, wages, the costs of goods, and housing affordability.
Shoup’s parking management goal is to have car parking available. As the saying goes, if you want parking that’s free, nearby, and available: pick two. Shoup picks the last two. Creating 200 square feet of public space at all times for everyone at no cost is searching for unicorns.
Good to meet you too! As far as my own habits: depends on the errand. When I took the kids to day care/early school, I usually did so on a bike (kid front seat, then trailer, then kid on own bike and one in rear bike seat). Sometimes I grocery shop on bike, usually I drive, in part because Salem hasn’t provided a safe way for me to get there (not because I couldn’t haul our family’s groceries on a bike). I’m hoping an e-bike longtail will let me carry groceries and kids, and am about to purchase one (cheaper than driving). Lots more logistical work as a parent than when I wasn’t one!
It’s fascinating to hear how you perceive parking reformers. Most of the Shoupistas I know aren’t car-free, but try to drive less than the average person. Sadly, often it is difficult to meet all our needs without a car, but *some* of those needs can be met with other modes.
Most of the Shoupistas I know just want cities that use their public space wisely and cities that aren’t dominated by cars. They want to reduce pollution, fight climate disruption, increase equity and fairness, decrease housing costs, and so on and so forth. Supporting parking reform while owning a car (or choosing to drive) don’t have to be separate. But it’s always good to center the experiences who aren’t privileged, including single parents, as we work through the policies.
Respectfully, you are making a lot of statements about an organization you don’t actually seem to know much about based on an article covering one event and a few photos of that event. Do you know who is on our board? Our advisory board, or our membership? Did you read our mission statement? What exactly is dogmatic about it?
How are the poorest 20% subsidizing those who drive?
Where are the poorest 20% at these meetings? That is the problem I have with this group. It should be possible to engage and include the people you are advocating for. It’s paternalistic just to have white guys as the loudest voice of what is best for all.
Working multiple jobs to get by. Stuck at home because they are disabled. Living on the streets. Etc Etc.
Statistically, the rich work longer hours than the poor, and only a small minority hold down multiple jobs. Disabled folks have equal access to meetings as long as we’re stuck in this zoom-fueled dystopia. Living on the street shouldn’t prevent someone from attending a meeting. Etc.
SO many ways.
But when it comes to parking: the cost of parking comes from somewhere. Those costs are hidden in the costs of other goods.
On-street parking comes out of the city tax base – it’s generally tax-free land folks who drive get to use, and those who don’t have to pay more taxes for to make up the difference. So it’s a bunch of free land (usually 10% or so of a city’s total land) given to people who park, but paid for by everyone. On-street parking maintenance is paid for by a mix of property taxes, fees, etc., not just gas taxes, and stormwater fees…
Off-street parking often makes up more than 50% of the average commercial property. So that’s paid for by increasing the cost of the goods sold, decreasing how much people get paid, and so on and so forth.
Off-street residential parking, again, makes up a huge amount of land used for housing – meaning higher rents, less housing, and soforth. If it’s paid for by market rate, and you can opt out, that helps. But usually it’s not – meaning those without cars are paying a bunch higher rent than they would have to without. Housing without parking in Minneapolis, for instance, is $200/month cheaper than it was when parking had to be provided.
ANYway, there’s also the non-parking costs: health care costs, pollution costs, all the other externalities that aren’t built into the cost of car ownership and use.
That helpful?
Plus, right above this one is an article which features an urban planner who calculated the opportunity costs of streets. How much exactly a road adds to the price of housing: https://bikeportland.org/2021/10/19/food-for-thought-maybe-our-streets-are-just-too-damn-wide-340007
I think there’s more to it than that. A lot of the land used for parking would need to be set aside anyway for deliveries, disabled vehicles, etc. And besides, it’s already built, and maintaining it is (far) cheaper than getting rid of it. If anything, residential parking saves the city money by not having to rebuild all our streets, and gas taxes pay for the maintenance.
Housing without parking is cheaper because people value parking and are willing to pay more to have it reserved and convenient. This is good, because those with no vehicles essentially get discounted rent.
And if stores didn’t provide parking, they’d (presumably) have fewer customers, so might have to raise prices or go out of business, which would be especially bad for non-drivers who want something closer.
As with many things, the “parking subsidy” issue is complex, nuanced, open to interpretation, and not really suitable for snappy statistical zingers.
Sure, but can we agree that free or underpriced parking is not working?
I can’t agree with a general statement like that on such a complex topic. I could agree with “In some situations, free or underpriced parking is not working, but in other situations it’s working fine.”
No, not helpful. Just because we don’t pay a “on street parking tax” doesn’t mean it is tax free land given to people who drive. If a resident pays property taxes they are paying for the maintenance of streets, including the parking area. I assume I am in the majority that expect the services rendered through paying my property taxes extend beyond my property lines. More importantly, the concept of getting to pick and choose which line items you want to pay for and don’t just isn’t how funding a city works. I don’t expect people who use the parks more than me to pay more for those or say that I am subsidizing their use. It is also probably important to note that the one of the main reasons Portland has more money to spend on more things is through increasing property taxes, and if you know about property taxes in OR that isn’t through everyone paying more. It is through new developments being assessed at current market values, which is why someone with a new home may easily pay 4-5x what their neighbors do with older homes even though the homes are “worth” nearly identical amounts. So, in the discussion of who is subsidizing who, it is very fair and accurate to say that someone occupying the lowest quintile of the income distribution is likely not subsidizing anyone for any use at all.
Off street parking does not increase the cost of goods or decrease how much people get paid. The value of the business using the land does that. Just because General Dollar on 82nd could eliminate their parking doesn’t mean they would double the size of the store, or all the sudden need to pay their employees more or charge less for items in the store.
On off street residential which sounds like you’re referencing rental multifamily housing of course it all depends on the location of the project and the market the project is in. As much as housing without parking may be cheaper in Minneapolis, in other cities without parking requirements it is still very expensive because the market doesn’t demand parking. In other areas, if the majority of residents drive and it is a lower quality asset, it is very possible the land lord is just trying to get whatever they can for rent, so they don’t care if a tenant drives or not, but that is not a non-driver subsidizing the parking lot for others.
Your property taxes don’t pay for roads; it’s primarily gas taxes and vehicle fees.
I’d respond in more detail if you were non-anonymous, but there are lots of falsehoods and errors in your argument. I’d suggest you read up on Trader Joe’s approach to parking lots (hint: less parking means cheaper goods! basic economics!) Cheers.
I have yet to see a Trader Joe’s that’s taken that line of reasoning to its obvious conclusion, and maxed out profit by eliminating their parking. It may be that too much parking is inefficient while too little also lowers profits. Like most things, there’s a sweet spot in the center there somewhere that’s least bad.
Irrespective of your stereotyping, anecdotes and generalizations about dudes, particularly of the Caucasian variety, which I can’t possibly imagine our esteemed editor allowing to describe any other demographic, I am pretty sure we should still charge for parking even though it sounds like you or your friends have spent far too long with some deadbeats.
I’m legitimately curious how much they are subsidizing those who drive.
Carless = doesn’t pay gas taxes
Poorest = lowest tax rates and might not pay taxes at all. Possibly getting other benefits that higher earners subsidize through taxes (not that there is anything wrong with that).
The carless pay gas taxes indirectly by anything they purchase – transport costs are typically passed onto the consumer. Poor people typically can only afford to live near the most polluted roadways, so they pay for their lives through higher health care costs and poorer outcomes in life. Poor people have no choices in these matters – they don’t choose to be poor – but they have the same rights to the commons (such as clean air and drinking water) as the rich and middle classes, yet they are frequently excluded and even repressed.
I’m always impressed when someone goes to the trouble to give me a negative rating – it makes me feel special, like I got a hundred likes. Thank you to whoever did so – you’ve made my day!
How do you even do that? It’s like magic!
This was the point with my question. I am pretty sure we’ve lost what it means to subsidize things, because folks in the bottom 20% of the income strata are heavily subsidized.
I don’t know about pampered but to me they do come across as smug and intolerant.
Gee, let’s continue to trash the environment and turn the earth into a dead planet because somebody, somewhere, could make a hypothetical argument that pro-environmental measures could possibly skew sexist and racist.
How is pointing out a very common issue for many outer Portland low income residents? Bicycling is a transportation system that only applies to people who live close to where they work and are able bodied. Not to mention those who have time.
You are being elitist. And the article makes it clear that you are making policy because you hate cars, not because it’s actually a good idea or a solution.
And if one is worried about air pollution,why remove lanes from busiest streets like Hawthorne and turn it in to a stand still?
There is a reason less and less people are biking in Portland despite huge money from biased city commissioners.being tone deaf will bring less and less support. Take that radical Iannarone for example.
You can’t solve climate crisis by p*ING off more and more voters and also making people get in traffic.
Eileen, this article is about parking, not about removing lanes. The city shouldn’t have to provide a free public space for people to store their private property. If you are storing your property on land that you do not own you should be expected to pay a cost. In fact, we could make many roads safer and add safe cycling infrastructure without removing any lanes just by eliminating free vehicle storage.
Adding lanes increases VMT, thus increasing GHG emissions per capita, dozens of studies have confirmed this, its called induced demand. The myth of more lanes meaning less traffic is just that… a myth.
Wanna hear how ridiculous this concept sounds:
“The city shouldn’t have to provide a free public space for people to recreate outdoors. If you are recreating outdoors on land that you do not own you should be expected to pay a cost.” So lets charge people who use the parks, lets charge people who use the bridges, lets charge people who use the libraries, etc., its not like we’re getting anything for our taxes right now anyway.
The city doesn’t provide a free public space for people to store their private property. Residents pay, largely through property taxes for the streets to be maintained, this includes area for the parking of a vehicle, because it isn’t much worth going to a place without a place for your vehicle temporarily.
I am all for meters for commercial areas, but not because this is some untaxed free land the city is just giving to drivers. I am for meters because it is shown to increase traffic to commercial areas which is a benefit for all the businesses there. To suggest that residents who already pay for parking via taxes, should have to pay again for the use of parking is pretty hilarious.
There are a lot of resources about how much it costs to maintain roads and who pays for them and as a BP reader you should be familiar with at least some of them. Your assertion that property taxes from people who don’t own cars should be used to maintain the expensive roadway (AND pay the opportunity cost of what else could be in that space) to store private vehicles is common, but it is damaging and inequitable.
Scarce public goods must be managed. In this case, it’s not like a park space (as you alluded to above). The car storage subsidy is not only unfair, it exacerbates many social problems like lack of abundant housing, climate change, traffic violence, and pollution.
It doesn’t take much imagination to come up with ways to mitigate the cost on low income households, so your argument boils down to, you want everyone else to pay for your parking space.
Property taxes from people who don’t own cars largely aren’t used to maintain the roadway. That comes primarily from gas taxes and vehicle fees. If anything, non-drivers are getting a benefit paid for by drivers (assuming you believe that roads are a net benefit for society).
As someone chastising others for not being familiar with the facts, I am surprised to see you promote your own unfacts.
And I’d like to see your analysis that the free parking in my neighborhood contributes to lack of housing, climate change, or traffic mayhem. Perhaps, just perhaps, you have a point with pollution (in some cases). Maybe if the city had been built differently, but given the (literally) concrete facts on the ground, none of these statements can be defended. It comes off as dogmatic.
Re-read what I wrote, I am not agreeing with PS (parking space?) about their property tax claim, I point out their inaccuracy in the first sentence. Whatever the revenue source that pays for “free” parking (rent, property tax, gas, tax, etc) it’s inequitable (and in ways that are not comparable to say, people with no kids paying for schools, another BS comparison often made).
As to whether unmanaged street parking contributes to those problems, let me direct you nextdoor or any neighborhood or planning meeting for the last 60 years where residential parking concerns have been used to reinforce exclusionary zoning, apartment bans, and on-site parking minimums. The same concerns prevent proper daylighting of intersections, protected bike lanes, and bus priority lanes.
My views and evidence are not completely summarized in this article or my comments. You are free to read my site, read Shoup’s work, and otherwise become informed elsewhere, or, get in touch, my phone number is in the photos!
Or keep scoring internet points by pointing out what you think are inconsistencies in an article or comments never meant to be canonical.
You’re conflating residential/business parking availability with free parking. The same concerns would exist even if parking were by paid permit in residential areas, or metered in a business district.
And whether or not you agree with PS’s opening statement, your claim that “free” parking is subsidized in the general case doesn’t really withstand scrutiny. At worst it’s paid for by drivers who always park on private property, which strikes me as about as bad as highways being subsidized by drivers who stick to surface streets.
Your assertion that people get to be offended by their tax dollars going to things they don’t use is insane and hilarious. Literally our entire society is based around a minority of people paying the vast majority of the tax revenue for things there is no way they get to use to the value of what they pay. Do you find that to be fair and equitable?
I am confused how your position that the parking areas of residential streets is a public good being used for private use is any different than any other common good we have in our city that is used by private citizens. We don’t give people rebates on their property taxes once their kids don’t go to school anymore. We don’t let people who are not homeless not pay for homeless services, so why is this exempt from this completely rational critique?
So my argument actually boils down to, I am good paying for things I don’t use in our society and others should be to. If they aren’t, I would suggest looking outside something that costs 2% of the city budget to maintain and provides a gigantic ROI.
I will simply point out a few things.
I never said people couldn’t be offended or complain.
Children and homeless people are humans. They are citizens who deserve care and support from society. Educating kids and housing the homeless is not only the right thing to do, it’s a benefit to everyone else in society. Public school is not for parents, it’s for children, fellow humans and citizens of our society.
That you think it’s a good argument to compare housing the homeless and educating kids to parking your car for free says all there is to say.
Making an analogy is not the same as saying things are the same level of importance. This is a frustratingly common fallacy.
I re-read your comment PS and I see I mis-read part of it. Makes sense too, because you are saying people shouldn’t be upset or advocate for change when their tax dollars are spent in ways they disagree with?
Really? Are you familiar with the concept of representative democracy and participatory government?
I’ve been following this conversation and wanted to add my two-cents and shift it a bit (away from the subsidy/taxes emphasis). In my neighborhood, pre-pandemic, a decent number number of my neighbors worked downtown or close-in. Some of them drove and paid to park in private lots rather than take the bus. It’s an affluent neighborhood, people can afford to pay to park. TriMet has cut service for years, and we’ve reached the bottom of the downward spiral.
The problem with having such limited service (three runs in morning, three in late afternoon) is that it strands a lot of people who can’t drive. My 90 year old neighbor can walk to the bus stop, and used to have a decent social life meeting with his old-men friends for coffee and doughnuts, but he is totally stranded and isolated now. Similar problem with the young high school students who get used to taking the bus to school, but then discover that it doesn’t do much for them with their summer schedules. (Every summer I get screenshots sent to me of NexDoor comments from 15 year olds bewailing being stuck at home.)
The reason TriMet gives for the cuts is low-ridership. If parking were less available, we would probably have better bus ridership numbers. The cost of poor bus service is born by a lot of people.
It also changes the neighborhood, slowly, over time. If public transit is important to you, you aren’t going to move to this neighborhood. 20 years ago, when I moved here, that wasn’t the case, but I wouldn’t move here now. Ending up in a situation where the closest neighborhood to downtown is forced to drive there seems to me like bad urban planning. (Some people walk it, one hardy soul I know has biked up and down the hill for 20 years–talk about chiseled, and some bus one way and uber home–so there is a mix.)
In order for transit to become viable once again, it is critical that, as you say, it run frequently and at odd times. However, it must also feel clean, safe (from both disease and violence), welcoming, comfortable, and be reasonably fast.
I don’t see TriMet improving on these metrics in the foreseeable future (it only takes one stabbing/shooting per year, or one encounter with someone experiencing an “episode” to convince folks it’s too dangerous). Removing private parking from downtown before there is a viable alternative in order to make the alternative viable will be a difficult and lengthy fight by a politician who wants to end their career.
TriMet’s model of fixed routes/schedule goes back to the 19th century; I can’t see how it will survive the coming transportation revolution.
That sinister force is cars, which Jordan very capably painted as a monstrous force of evil when allowed to run amok in cities. “Every new structured parking space built is a generational commitment to the status quo of car dependency and the climate crisis. Car parking is fossil fuel infrastructure as much as building a new freeway or oil refinery,” he said.
It’s Cars versus Godzilla as cities are strewn with wreckage, bodies everywhere! Cars are sinister evil as they suck the blood out of their drivers! Cars create dependency, getting people addicted to meth, gasoline, and gas station mini marts! Cars destroy the natural organic landscape, replacing the Shire with parking lots as far as the eye can see! Cars enslave people to drive them everywhere!
If this subculture actually believed parking is “dastardly” they would work to get rid of it (in well-resourced neighborhoods) instead of making parking a Randian “free market” money-printing machine. And if this subculture actually believed their own “social justice” rhetoric they would leave people displaced to the car-dependent periphery by NIMBY/YIMBY greed the @#$% alone (until they have access to decent transportation alternatives).
Honest question, soren: do you do any nonreactive writing? I see you do a calling out of other people’s efforts as insufficient or wrongheaded on BP, but I don’t know if I’ve seen you write freestanding “here’s my vision for how this should all work” stuff. Maybe you have a substack blog and I just don’t know about it? I’m genuinely curious about your viewpoint, but I don’t feel like I get it in a complete way from posts like this one.
It’s a rare post from Soren that does not include the word “USAnian”, so we should feel blessed.
https://bikeportland.org/2021/10/19/i-just-cant-cycle-anymore-says-60-year-old-rider-after-car-user-allegedly-hit-her-340090#comment-7437697
Thanks!
I thought I read that Portland already got rid of most parking requirements with the zoning changes after the last comprehensive plan update. So all the “lots being dug up for an apartment’s underground garage” is being done voluntarily by developers, in response to a demand that clearly exists.
So what’s the policy goal here? Do they want to make parking illegal?
This article is covering a fundraising event for a national organization. Portland has made a lot of progress, the goal here is to help other cities make the same progress.
Many if not all of those changes happened because of the advocacy of Tony and others prior to him forming the Parking Reform Network. They’re evidence of success!
sigma,
It didn’t make it into the article, but there was a funny part of Tony’s talk where he said how disappointed he was that Portland’s parking policies were actually pretty OK! And yeah, like others have said, this story is about how Tony and his crew are now part of a national nonprofit that wants to make great parking policy everywhere.
Another thing to consider…The North American parking industry is undergoing another generational shift as ‘common’ vehicle sizes have returned to the excess length and widths more typical of the 1960s-1970s period…and so there will be a big push to “fix” the minimum specifications that cities and developers will be using to plan for ’50 year’ parking structures [recently discussed in the industry magazine ‘Parking Today’]…so one tool to consider adopting is setting minimum parking fees based on square footage of the vehicle footprint vs. ‘POP’ (pay one price).
https://www.parkingtoday.com
Jonathan, on the subject of zoning reform, please read this story about how City Council is on the cusp of inadvertently enabling Portland’s richest neighborhoods to roll back recent housing density rules and lock out the next generation of Portlanders: https://www.sightline.org/2021/10/19/bogus-historic-districts-the-new-exclusionary-zoning/
Reading Sightline on zoning is like reading Grover Norquist on taxes. I’ll stick to things that are a little more nuanced.
I wonder how many in attendance drove to this meeting and parked their cars in this neighborhood. From the look of it, at least 90%. This crowd looks affluent, white, skewing older … definitely not like a crowd that takes the bus. I don’t see any cycling kit either.
are you being serious with this comment? As if people wear must wear “cycling kits” to ride a bike! I bet most people biked or walked to the meeting. And no one wore any “kit”. And some of them were even “skewing older” and still managed to bike. Amazing huh? Also, who really cares? Why try and judge people based on their travel behavior to one event. That is so tiring and unhelpful. What if someone drove to this meeting, and it was the first time they’d driven for weeks?
Let’s focus on the issue and keep our eyes on the prize instead of making judgments on people and situations you know nothing about.