Okay, I definitely misread this. :) That said, I suspect my misread is because...

Is parking an unsolved problem? I think in most cities it's a solved problem, and the consequence is traffic. But I would be curious of your take given that it's the question you asked. What is there to solve for parking?

edit: Also, Public Transportation, arguably, fixes both traffic and parking.

If parking were the only problem, you could call it solved in places where taxis are cheap and ubiquitous, which might happen in the developed world with self driving cars.

But ya, if we could eliminate parking, we have some more space for some nice things, but having lived it, it doesn’t solve the main problem at all if private transportation is still viable.

> but having lived it, it doesn't solve the main problem at all if private transportation is still viable.

I'm having trouble parsing that sentence, could you clarify?

It is possible for private personal transport to be viable without parking, and in that case, we can still run 80th the too many cars/not enough road problem.

ah, okay. My counter, if this only solves one of the problems (parking), why would we prefer that over public transit which solves 2 problems.

Personal transport is convenient. I admit to changing my schedule to super early in the morning and leaving work at 3 just so I could take a taxi rather than deal with the subway due to Beijing’s harsh traffic jams. It wasn’t the right choice for society, but it was the right choice for me.

Good public transit is convenient. Ask anyone in any city with good public transit how they commute. Trains and buses that run all day consistently are even cheaper and more convenient to plan around.

"[A developed city isn't one where poor people take cars but where rich people take public transit.]"

if we solve parking then we have more space for offices, shops, etc, which means more people travelling into the area, which means more traffic. only public transport and walking can properly scale up.