Downtown Los Angeles faces a looming parking shortage that could stifle development, according to an initial study by the Community Redevelopment Agency of Los Angeles.

The first phase of the report, released last week, suggests a range of solutions, from building public garages as was done in downtown Santa Monica and Pasadena’s Old Town, to forcing developers of surface lots to replace the original parking in their projects.

“It’s suddenly getting like New York,” said Jeff Carpenter, a city planner with the CRA who is heading up the study. “We’re now discovering downtown revitalization has consequences.”

Five years ago, 3,500 people lived downtown but by the year’s end more than 10,000 are expected to move into the thousands of recently completed apartments and condominiums.

Most of those units are in formerly vacant office buildings that were converted under the city’s adaptive reuse ordinance, which allows owners to change their properties into apartments or condominiums without having to add parking.

Residents of those buildings depend on nearby surface lots and garages. But developers are snapping up many of the lots, paying as much as $300 a foot for land to build condominiums and apartments.

Already, Trammell Crow Residential is nearing completion of the first phase of a Little Tokyo residential complex on the former site of a surface parking lot that will consist of 500 apartments.

And CIM Group Inc. expects to break ground in February on its Market at 9th & Flower, which will contain a Ralphs supermarket below 270 condominiums. The project will replace an expansive surface lot and a low-rise parking garage on Ninth between Hope and Flower streets.

Both developments contain enough parking for new residents and retailers, but each will take away a significant amount of parking used by residents and office workers.

Los Angeles City Councilwoman Jan Perry, whose district includes most of downtown, said the disappearance of the surface lots doesn’t bother her.

“One of the best ways we can head off a problem is by looking at this as an opportunity to have more shared uses,” she said. “It depends on the location and use, but I am generally supportive of developers who want to take surface parking lots and build projects on them. It’s a higher and better use than just a parking lot.”

Stranglehold

The report, based on interviews with residents, business owners and office workers, found that street parking was full during daytime hours, although many of the meters were broken. Private parking garages were found to have confusing traffic patterns and overly expensive prices, and many respondents said surface lots were subject to crime and vandalism.

“The challenges of parking are greater in magnitude than we ever imagined,” said Carpenter, who suggested formation of a city/county parking authority that could regulate, manage and set rates for downtown’s parking supply. “Downtown faces the prospect of being stuck in a lower level (of development) than it deserves to be.”

If developers don’t have access to adequate parking, they won’t be able to gain enough financing to get adaptive reuse projects off the ground. Lenders usually demand a minimum of one parking space for each unit, Carpenter said. If those units can’t be found and secured for at least the time of the loan, then many banks won’t finance the construction.

“We have many developers beating a path to our door saying they have a property they know is a good prospect for conversion but their financial sources say they don’t have enough parking,” he said. “In some cases, they can get parking today and tomorrow but not for the 10 to 30 years of the life of the loan.”

A similar situation exists for public projects. For example, the $1.2 billion Grand Avenue project would replace four parking garages currently used by city workers and jurors. During construction those lots would be closed for up to two years, Carpenter said.

Paying for it

Since the CRA doesn’t have funds to spend downtown, public garages are almost out of the question. One idea is to pay for them with parking improvement districts, where property owners would contribute to a central construction and maintenance fund.

Duane H. Cameron, president of System Parking Development Co., owner of about 4,000 spaces in the historic core said developers are trying to get the taxpayers to bail them out.

“Developers now want the city to provide free parking for them or subsidized parking for them,” he said. “The reason they got those buildings so cheap in the first place was because they were old buildings that didn’t have any parking. Their answer has been to put it on the taxpayers back and ask them to pay for it.”

Downtown resident Roderick Diaz said he would sacrifice easy parking for more restaurants, shops and people walking around the streets.

Diaz, an L.A. native who spent years in pedestrian-friendly cities such as Boston, Washington and San Francisco, said he would encourage the city to require even less parking in new developments.

“Eventually I would like to see a downtown where you won’t necessarily get rid of all the cars but where you would have more people on the streets,” he said.

Carpenter said changing the expectations of commuters and residents can’t be accomplished overnight.

“As with politics, parking is local very local,” he said. “We want to raise the awareness of people that it’s not as local as they are used to anymore. In the future, people may not be able to park and walk through the door to their final destination.”