Tag Archives: driving

Local regulations, small stores, and parking at Trader Joe’s

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Why can it be hard to park at Trader Joe’s? Here is one answer:

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Because, at least there, local zoning ordinances for parking nicely matched demand. In short, Trader Joe’s have smaller-than-usual parking lots because they prefer smaller-than-average stores. According to a company spokesperson, every Trader Joe’s in the Chicago area is intended to be unique, but in general, they average 8,000 to 12,000 square feet of floor space. For comparison, many Jewel-Osco locations offer around 50,000 square feet. This matters because, in most cities and towns, commercial parking is zoned according to business size. For instance, the city of Chicago requires about 2.5 to 5 spaces for every 1,000 feet of store, depending on the type of shop. There are, of course, exceptions, so many that critics complain that zoning for parking can seem arbitrary.

“Sometimes the standard is square feet, sometimes it’s another metric,” said Alex Montero, chairperson of Strong Towns Chicago, the local chapter of a national group that advocates for livable, walkable cities. “A bowling alley might require a certain number of parking spaces per bowling lane. And the thing is, there’s a tendency everywhere — this is a universal problem — to overestimate the problem. Why? Because every politician has had the frustration of not being able to park next to the front door.”

A Trader Joe’s spokesperson declined to comment directly on its parking lots, but rather directed me to a podcast hosted by a pair of its marketing executives, who said they have heard the whispers, the claims that their parking lots are part of a conspiracy to drive people insane — but, look, their stores are small, and that brings bureaucratic standards.

This reminds me of some of the suburban debates about parking at businesses that took place during the postwar era. Businesses located in traditional downtowns – think Main Street and a few surrounding blocks with two to three story buildings – went back and forth about parking meters and ways to make sure shoppers could find parking (and also figure out where employees could park). But as they debated, new strip malls and shopping malls were opening up all over the landscape with plentiful free parking. A comparison to the big box stores and shopping malls today make any small and crowded parking lot look unpleasant. (How about a companion article about trying to find a spot at Trader Joe’s at the busiest times versus finding a spot at Costco at the busiest times?)

If I am reading between the lines of the story cited above, the real issue is that most shoppers at Trader Joe’s are driving their own vehicle there. They might come with a few family members or friends but if everyone is coming in a vehicle and doing their shopping when others are shopping, parking can be tight. Using mass transit or walking to a nearby grocery store might be doable for some but is either not practical or not possible or not imaginable for many others. Trader Joe’s may be smaller in footprint and have its own approach to selling groceries but it is still subject to American driving culture and infrastructure.

Trying to expand bus service in the Chicago suburbs

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Pace has a new plan under consideration that would make bus service more plentiful in the Chicago metropolitan region:

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A 50% overall spike in bus service across the region is among the promises in Pace’s ambitious ReVision plan…

“Travel patterns have changed, and fewer people commute downtown every day. Public input and ridership trends show growing demand for nontraditional transit trips — and when we increase frequency and make our service faster, ridership grows.”

The aim is to increase ridership with more frequent buses and reduction of transit deserts in far-flung communities from rural McHenry to south suburban Cook counties…

Another priority is 50% growth on fixed routes, Pace Pulse lines on corridors like the Dempster Street Line and Cermak/22nd Street Line, as well as On-Demand service.

Given the difficulties bus service has faced in the Chicago suburbs for decades, here is what I could image would provide hope for increased ridership:

  1. Increased suburban densities. Suburban areas sprawl out from the city but a number of suburban population centers in the Chicago region have pursued denser development in their downtowns and other locations. Buses could link some of these job and residence centers where driving is currently the only option.
  2. High gas prices. When would suburbanites find it too expensive to drive everywhere and instead take advantages of bus routes when they could? It might require really expensive gasoline.
  3. A changing view of buses and mass transit compared to drive. Americans tend to drive when they have the resources to do so. They like the freedom driving offers and prefer not to be with others. Could bus travel have a higher status in the suburbs?
  4. Increasingly bad traffic. More residents and more vehicles on the road could push people to mass transit.

And the article notes that this is possible because of funding created through the creation of the Northern Illinois Transportation Authority.

Driving is so part of American suburban life that it will be interesting to see if this expanded bus service is successful. Suburbs change – but will they change in such a way that bus travel becomes common?

No need to use local landmarks while driving

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I have read a number of local and metropolitan histories recently and some of these books include driving or walking tours. The tours guide readers through several hours of driving across suburban communities to see key sites and scenery or along walking paths through a community or neighborhood.

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To direct people on the tour and help them understand the local landscape, the texts rely on local landmarks. See an important civic building or a church or cross a river and then turn. They mark important memories or groups or features of a community. Even someone unfamiliar with the community might get a sense of a landmark’s importance from its prominence or scale or the way people interact with it. There are mileage markers – such as travel 1.3 miles on a particular road – and some wayfaring via finding particular roads and intersections. But the tour is geared around meaningful local places and buildings. The landmarks are an important part of the tour and they help the touring party make it to the next stage. Without such landmarks, what would people on the tour pay attention to and how would they know where to go?

This way of navigating was not confined only to tours. If you needed to get from place to place, you could work with landmarks, signs, and people to get where you needed to go.

This strategy of finding one’s way through a place via landmarks is gone. A good road map with local roads – and not one that primarily relies on major highways and interstates – could replace a step by step tour guide.

But a GPS system really ends it. If the goal is the quickest or most efficient route, that path may or may not pass by local landmarks. Because many important buildings or local places are located along major roadways, you might still see landmarks. But you do not really need to pay attention. A driver can focus on the map screen and the next direction given. It almost does not matter what is going by outside the vehicle windows; it is what is happening on the way to the next step.

Automated driving or touring could free up people to be better observers of the world around them. I am not sure it has worked out that way.

ADDED 10/1/26

Thinking more about this post, I was reminded of a scene from Season 4 of The Office:

GPS: Make a right turn.[Michael starts to turn right]

Dwight Schrute: Wait, wait, no no no, it means “bear right.” Up there.

Michael Scott: No, it said right. It said take a right.

Dwight Schrute: No, no. Look, it means go up to the right — bear right — over the bridge, and hook up with 307.GPS: Make a right turn.

Michael Scott: Maybe it’s a shortcut, Dwight. It said go to the right.[he turns right]Dwight Schrute: It can’t mean that, there’s a lake there!

GPS: Proceed straight.

Michael Scott: I think it knows where it is going.

Dwight Schrute: This is the lake! THIS IS THE LAKE!

Michael Scott: The machine knows! Stop yelling at me! Stop yelling!

Dwight Schrute: NO! IT’S UP THERE! THERE’S NO ROAD HERE![It’s too late. Michael drives right into the lake]

Dwight Schrute: Remain calm, I have trained for this![he unbuckles his seat belt]

Dwight Schrute: Okay. Exit the window! Here we go![Dwight and Michael climb out the windows]

GPS: Make a u-turn, if possible.

You do not need landmarks, like lakes, if the GPS voice is telling you where to go.

Organizing the “bike bus” in a car-dependent society

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When American communities often require driving, it can take a lot of work to provide students with alternatives for getting to school. Enter the “bike bus” in the Chicago region:

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The idea behind the bike bus is simple: Once a week, a group of kids and parents bike to school together. Parents typically organize the bike bus and ride as chaperones, blocking drivers at intersections as the group passes. The route is shared in advance. People wait and join along the way…

The bike bus concept can be traced to Belgium in 1998. But it became popular just as the world emerged from the COVID-19 pandemic. Some Chicago bike bus organizers say they were inspired by Sam Balto, who reportedly organized the first U.S. bike bus in 2022 in Portland, Oregon. Balto has said he was inspired by video of a “bicibús” in Barcelona, Spain, the year prior…

In 1969, nearly 50% of children either walked or biked to grade school, according to a national survey. By 2017, the number dropped to 11%. Meanwhile, the number of kids driven to school rose from 12% to 50%.

But as long as Chicago’s streets are considered dangerous for cyclists and children, parents may have to stick with the safety of the bike bus.

On one hand, this story makes sense. Americans like to drive and have to drive. To pick alternative forms of transportation – walking, biking, mass transit, etc. – requires either certain infrastructure and planning or big efforts. Even in a city like Chicago that is more walkable in places than many other American communities, driving is common and/or is a default setting. Roads are set up to move as many cars as possible through while limiting other options.

Does the data comparing 1969 to 2017 tell a slightly different story? Back in 1969, more kids walked or biked to elementary school. What else changed between then and now such that this number dropped so dramatically? Plenty of Americans had cars in 1969. For example, these numbers could be affected by perceptions parents and guardians have about safety.

Either way, the “bike bus” pushes back against the norms of the driving system. With collective efforts, adults and kids can bike to school. Doing this requires collective efforts for people to organize and participate. It could require more effort compared to the default of driving.

I would be interested to see what happens to the bike busses. Will they grow? Will they happen more days or even every day? Why not also conduct them in bad weather? Imagine neighborhood efforts every morning and afternoon to walk or bike kids to school. Imagine schedules and community priorities that allow time and space for this to happen.

An ongoing question: will higher gas prices in the US lead to less driving?

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If gas prices do indeed keep going up, how might this affect all the driving that takes place in the United States? An ongoing public discussion or debate involves the price point that would push more Americans to not drive. At some point, the assumption is that people would drive less because they cannot afford it.

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I would counter that many Americans cannot afford to not drive. How would people get to work or school? Gas might get expensive but there are few travel alternatives in many American communities.

Perhaps we have some newer solutions to these questions:

-Remote work and school. It may not be ideal and a global pandemic pushed the country into this in the past but having really expensive gas would be a major problem for many people.

–Deliveries via truck make a lot of the economy work. But what if more goods could be delivered via drone? Or electric vehicles?

-Fleets of electric cars ferrying people around. I don’t know if we have a critical mass of these vehicles but since many vehicles sit parked much of the day, could they be used continuously to get people around?

Put another way, what would Americans give up in their lives if gas becomes more expensive? Driving for fun might be first to go but what comes next?

Performance vehicle in advertisement traveling at 36 mph

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There are many commercials for cars, trucks, and SUVs. They highlight the excitement and comfort one can experience in the moving vehicle.

However, the vehicles in the ads are often not moving very fast. The drives shown on screen are leisurely drives down calm streets. This was highlighted again for me in an ad where the speedometer showed the expensive and powerful vehicle going 36 miles per hour. This is a typical drive on an American road.

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Why not show more vehicles going down calm highways at higher speeds? Why not show more regular driving situations many Americans face where a faster speed makes sense (excluding going 40+ in a residential area or going way over the speed limit on a highway)?

Two hypothesis come to mind:

  1. Feedback shows people respond well to seeing new vehicles in calm driving environments. People have enough stress driving every day. They associate a new vehicle with a calmer experience, even if that does not happen in their daily life with the vehicle.
  2. The car companies have limited locations where they can film advertisements and promotional material. Some of the same sites keep showing up. Filming in regular driving situations is hard or impossible.

Americans may like the idea of driving but reminding them of the stresses of daily driving may not motivate them to buy a new car. Even expensive cars do not make it easier to avoid traffic or turn traffic lights in your favor or significantly change travel times.

Free and plentiful parking helped make shopping malls popular. Charging for mall parking is a different approach.

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In the early days of American shopping malls, one of their appeals was that they had big, free parking lots. Compared to parking situations in urban downtowns or main streets in smaller communities (fewer spaces, parking meters, more traffic), shopping malls made it easy to get in and out by car. Paying for parking would not be needed.

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Some malls have recently offered paid parking for parking spots closer to the mall. This story describes some of the reactions:

Signs instruct shoppers to scan a QR code or send a text message to a five-digit number to shell out $2.45 for the first hour and $2 for every hour after that. The cap is $10.45 a day…

In all, 23 malls out of over 95 GGP properties offer “preferred” parking across the country, according to spokesperson Lindsay Kahn…

Free mall parking is the latest complimentary perk on the verge of extinction. For some budget-conscious consumers, it’s the final straw, like a cover charge just to spend more money. Or as one Redditor put it: “Pay us so we can take your money.”

Jay Reed captured the collective exasperation in a popular video on his YouTube channel: “They’re Now Charging To Park At Malls And People Are LOSING IT.”…

Some annoyed shoppers say they will just spend their money elsewhere. Others have a simpler solution. “Amazon,” one Facebook commenter said. “Free parking.”

Given the state of brick and mortar retail, perhaps starting to charge for parking will not help. As stated above, why hassle with the possibility of paid parking when you can order online “for free”?

Americans expect parking to be free or cheap. Much of American life relies on driving and people expect to be able to park near where they want to go for no or little cost. Whether it should be free or cheap is a different question – should parking pay for its own maintenance and/or impact? can businesses make money off parking? – from whether Americans expect to have free parking.

I wonder if malls could pitch the paid parking as part of an ongoing shift of shopping malls from retail to entertainment broadly defined. People pay for parking at sporting events and concerts. If paid parking is part of a unique entertainment experience and not just maybe buying something, would people be more willing to pay?

Or, as some communities have done, another approach would be to reduce the number of parking spots malls are required to have. If they could instead develop more of the out-lot space, perhaps they could generate the money they want without having to resort to charging for parking.

Driving through places over and over again – and never stopping there

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There is a category of places that we know but we do not know. In the United States where driving is a daily part of life, people regularly pass through neighborhoods, communities, and places in which they rarely or never stop. It is just along the way. The driver is just driving through. What do we know about such places? A few thoughts, with the example of Gary, Indiana in mind as I have driven back and forth past Gary many times (and only stopped there a few times).

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  1. We are limited to what we can see from a moving vehicle. Yet, we can see some things while driving by, even at fast highway speeds. We tend to see what is along major roads, which can include road signs, billboards, big box stores, exits and intersections, some smaller commercial and residential properties. Some of the signs and properties try to get our attention, often to tell us about a brand, product, place, or attraction. This might tell us about the biggest things to see and do. Passing by Gary via highway, I can see a minor league baseball stadium, steel mills, and some bigger downtown buildings. I can see highway exits and the kinds of establishments that gather there. I see signs for an airport and a few other things to do.
  2. We hear or tell stories about these places. I have read about Gary, heard about Gary, talked about Gary. Some themes: created out of sand dunes as an industrial suburb, steel mills, the home of the Jacksons, decline and white flight, limited development and reinvestment, and new ideas for revitalization. As I drive by, how does what I see contribute to or refute those stories? How much am I fitting what I see to a narrative I already have?
  3. The few stops I have made are different than just driving by. Setting foot in a community, driving at slower speeds and maybe walking around, provides a different experience. So does talking to people or taking a tour. It helps to slow down, get to a pedestrian level, and have time to observe and interact. (See earlier posts about how to know a suburb or community – first steps, deeper steps.)

I could come up with a list of many other communities where the same is true: I have driven through it or passed by it and know relatively little about it. And if we tend to emphasize getting to our destination rather than seeing what is on the way on the journey, we could go through or by places hundreds or thousands of times. Highways do not facilitate getting to know places; this seems to be part of the argument about what happens to Radiator Springs in the Pixar film Cars. Trains may offer different views (and maybe some more stops) at similar speeds while airplanes allow people to just hop even faster over places without even seeing them.

There are ways this could be addressed. Could we get more information about places as we pass them? This is hard to do on road signs. How about voice explanations in maps or GPS systems? How about using the voices of local residents to describe their community and tell stories of what has happened?

The motorized vehicles that make American parades possible

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Numerous American communities held parades for July 4th. These parades are full of cars and motorized vehicles: they tow floats, they accompany walkers, and cars and vehicles (old and new) are on display.

Cars have dominated the American landscape for roughly a century. Before this, the United States had roads and animals and people could carry things along those roads. Parades happened prior to cars but it is hard to imagine parades today without motorized vehicles traveling the route. Yes, there are people involved that attendees may want to see but driving is essential to make the parade happen.

Take a recent parade I participated in. Most of the members of the group walked. We carried a banner in the front with the name of our organization and members of the group walked behind it. But we also had a truck with this that included large signs about the organizations, supplies, and a few people.

There were multiple vehicles in front of us in the parade. July 4th parades often feature local emergency vehicles; in our case, big fire trucks honked their way along. As shown above, there was a group with antique cars and trucks. Behind us, several sports cars inched forward, revving their engines while traveling at 3 mph. The vehicles themselves may symbolize American freedoms.

Or I recall the 2016 parade for the World Series winning Chicago Cubs. That event brought millions to Chicago. Could the players have walked through the city streets instead of taking a series of busses along the route? (Such busses are a common approach for championship parades.)

Marches and parades without vehicles can still happen. But in a country full of driving, cars and vehicles are part of and enable many processions.

Survey 3,000 Americans and develop a list of 100 “most passive aggressive roads”?

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Several roads in the Chicago area were named this week as being among the most passive aggressive roads in the United States:

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Naperville’s Ogden Avenue may be a daily driving staple for many Naperville residents, but it also comes with its challenges. A very unspoken challenge to be exact.

According to a survey from Sacramento-based company American River Wellness, it’s considered to be one of the most passive aggressive roads in the country, coming in at spot No. 88 out of 100, and among the top three in Illinois.

North Avenue in Chicago took the No. 10 spot on the national list followed by Green Bay Road in the North Shore suburbs at No. 11. Ventura Boulevard in Los Angeles ranked No. 1 in the survey, followed by U.S. 1/Federal Highway in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, at No. 2 and Central Avenue (Yonkers to White Plains Corridor) in Westchester County, New York, at No. 3.

How did this list come about?

The organization surveyed 3,011 drivers in May to identify the roads and routes most likely to cause passive-aggressive driving behavior, including tailgating, blocking merges, brake-checking and excessive honking.

Here is what American River Wellness said about their methodology:

Methodology: This study surveyed 3,011 U.S. drivers in May 2026 to identify the roads and routes most likely to cause passive-aggressive driving behavior, including tailgating, blocking merges, brake-checking, and excessive honking. Respondents were selected from a geographically representative online panel, balanced by age, gender, and region. To ensure data quality, responses underwent screening measures including bot detection, geo-verification, speeding checks, and manual review. Results were weighted to reflect national population benchmarks.

For a survey of Americans, having over 3,000 people is a good number (if a good sample is obtained). But there are lots of roads in the United States in lots of places. For example, there are over 300 metropolitan areas in the United States. More people live in the larger metropolitan areas – the most populous 11 have over 5,000,000 people in their metro area – so it could be easier to find people from these places. Some states have fewer metro areas and smaller ones.

I would want to know (1) how many people were surveyed from each geographic location (metro areas? states? other communities?) and then (2) how many roads were people asked about or asked to refer to?

Take North Avenue in Chicago which in at #10. By population of the Chicago metro area, residents account for roughly 2.5-3% of the US population as a whole. So if the survey was weighted by population, we might expect 90 respondents from the Chicago area. How many of them in the region can comment on North Avenue which traverses one part of the city? As a resident of the Chicago area, I have been on North Avenue in the city at least a few times. It would take a lot more work for me to link those experiences to the passive aggressive driving behaviors. I am much more familiar with Ogden Avenue in Naperville but would not have thought about passive aggressive driving there unless prompted. (See earlier posts about Ogden Avenue here and here. Imagine this then for smaller cities and communities. How many were surveyed? How many roads were they asked about or they experienced?

I wonder if there would be other ways to get at passive aggressive driving across all American roads. Satellite images of situations that lead to passive aggressive driving? Cell phone data of locations? Local policy decisions intended to limit traffic and congestion issues on certain roadways?