Raising on-street parking meter rates to reflect market value is a dangerous idea, we're told, because it will coerce customers away from businesses in Seattle's commercial centers and send them to far-flung places where parking is cheaper or free---like Bellevue, Northgate, and Southcenter.

But the underlying premise of that contention---that existing businesses depend on a public subsidy for driving, so we must go on subsidizing drivers forever---is critically flawed; and it ignores the mountains of negative impacts that subsidy also reinforces.

Fostering commercial centers where retail can thrive without a car-dependent clientele is a key component of Seattle's established plan to create urban centers that enable transportation choices besides private autos. Incentives that make driving an artificially attractive option are powerful impediments to that evolution, and feed the vicious cycle of car dependence.

Keeping on-street parking rates below market rate might help some businesses in the short term, but in the long term, it's self-defeating. It would be far more constructive if the knee-jerk reaction against higher parking rates could be redirected to creative thinking about how to promote the vibrant urban retail that everyone wants in a way that makes sense for the future.

And of course there is another potential benefit of charging more for on-street parking---it raises revenue that can be directed to investments that make walking, biking, and transit more attractive options, which will then catalyze retail centers that flourish even as they become less and less beholden to cars.

A transition away from our malignantly unbalanced, car-centric transportation system will not be totally painless for everyone. Given the unprecedented, monumental challenges that we are up against, there's no way we can successfully respond without stirring up the pot. (Though if we stir it up right, we actually have the opportunity to create something better for everyone in the long run.)

The obvious, no-brainer first step government should take is to stop subsidizing things that thwart sustainability. Parking is one of those things. The second step is to place an economic penalty on those things, a topic I plan to address in a future post.