Comments by "" (@josephfisher426) on "Can U.S. Cities Build Narrow European Streets?" video.

  1. It probably IS a condo. When they're short on space, a lot of developers look to use "two-over-twos," which is like selling a townhouse twice minus the expense of setting up the condominium regime.
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  2. A variation on this, in jurisdictions where parking is perceived to be an issue, is that a "non-conversion agreement" is required for the garage. To guarantee that it won't be made into a room, at least not with permits... Typical modern construction often isn't terribly repurposable to begin with. Two-story foyers and wide open kitchens with no stacks going through the ceiling don't lend themselves to making an upstairs apartment...
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  3.  @plankton50  At bottom it's all about the fire trucks. Pretty stupid when they're requiring sprinklers on everything anyway. My parents' house is on a 16 foot wide one-way street with parking on one side, and somehow that has worked for almost 100 years... and I am on a two-way street that isn't more than 28 feet wide and has parking on both sides. People will work it out. But it is apparently hard for planners to believe that. Your idea would work... but so would regulating garages so that people didn't get unrealistic expectations of being able to park a car in the first place. Regulating unit sizes would also work. Street parking on townhouses without garages comes fairly close to being sufficient all by itself... it's when there are multiple units per house and normalized 3-car households that you run out of space.
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  4. Was it an orphanage or a whole prison complex?! An orphanage would be one building...
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  5. They can. Will the fire department sign off?
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