As Eric de Place over at Sightline reports today, a little-known provision of Seattle law requires bars to provide space for patrons to park—one parking spot for every 250 square feet of bar space.

It seems to me that if we don't want people to drive home from bars then, at minimum, we should not force bars to provide parking spaces on the property. Call me crazy.

At the risk of making sweeping generalizations, I'm pretty sure that parking is for people who drive cars. And I'm also pretty sure that the core business model of bars is selling alcohol for consumption on the premises. Which means that our parking codes are basically encouraging people to drink and drive.

Oh, and if you think that bar parking is for designated drivers, Jonathan [Hiskes, of Grist] points to a CDC study showing that there's insufficient evidence to support designated driver programs.

Parking minimums for residential housing are dumb . Parking minimums for bars are insane. Getting rid of them won't eliminate drinking and driving, but it's far smarter public policy than outright encouraging people to do so.

I have a call out to the city's Department of Planning and Development to find out more about the origin of the policy and whether it's strictly enforced.