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Home My WebLink AboutMiscellaneousANALYSIS OF MOVIE T~IEATER PARKING REQUIREMENTS IN COLLEGE STATION . PURPOSE In. October of thi-s year:.the Planning' Divisi®n received two requests that the City review its parking requirement for-motion picture theaters, One request indicated that the motion_pict~ure industry has un~e~°gor~~ a transition f ron~ the- bne a~i~ditorium / large sorcen concept t® the smaller multi-screen theater ha~in a common lobb and vendi g Y ~ n.g area. It was sugge:~ted that -the imp;~ct of tha.s change zs that less: ~~rkn~ ie needed for the multi- screen theater than the. one large auditorium. The basis f®r this suggestion ~.~ that.. ~ popular movie a~t a ane screen theater v~i:ll fill every seat. in-the theater chile the. sane mode-at a multi- screen facility will fill one theater, but other screens with less popular m®vies X11 have vaeant seats. CURRENT REQUIREMENTS IN COLLEGE STATION The .parking requirer~ent for motion icture theaters in Coll p egE. Station was changed ~.n 196. It was changedfrom one space per three seats-plus employee parking to one parking space per 2.5 seats (.4 parking paces per sea ~. At-that time there were three theater facilitic~ in College Station. The oldest was a .three screen theater located i~ a shopping center, another a multi-screen ~acil~y located in an enclosed mall and the third gas a stand-alone facility. The shopping center There the theater is located has had park~.ng problems in the past. The qty's parking requirement fcr shopping centers takes into account -that: a mix of uses rill occur v~hose hours ®f operation and demand for parkin will differ such g thaw shared park~.ng can o~cure Generally theater parking is extensive, but complementary to, rather than competitive with, the demand for parking in a shopping cen er.(1) ~ concentrati.on of high traffic. generators anal uses whose hours of o eration are P the same. should be avoided in a oenter to eliminate compet~.tion for spaces. This has. noteal~ays been the case in the center in Colle e g Station where the theater is located. The park~.ng_problems there have been. due, not to an inadequate-parking requirement, but to an unbalanced min of .uses:. A large p®rtion of the c~r~ter contained traffic generators whose .hours of operation were the sane as the ~he~ter andwhose parking demand was high as well. then th@ ordinance was revised in 1986 two things were Chan ed g that affected motion picture-theaters. The. theater parking require~ent was increased and the percents a of intense uses that g could be located in a shopping center was limited. It a ears that both than PP ges right have been made in response to the situation at the shopping center described above. How ever, the latter change would have been sufficient to solve the problem at l that shopping center without raisin the theater arkin g p g requirement itself. Theparkin re urement_f®r a sho in g ~ pp g center combined pith the limi ati®h on intense uses is ads oats to handle th ~ q~ e instances where theaters. are located in shoppa.ng centers. The question is whether the requirement for the stand- alone facility is too high. The.. stand.-alone facility that was o erred 'ust rior to the ord' ~ p J p finance change is a three screen theater with a total of 92l seats and 325 parking spaces® This provides a ratio of one park ing space for every 2 . ~ seats . The et~ti~e ' park ~.ng area, which inciudes parking to the rear ®f the facilit has b ~'~ een 70 percent occ~p~.ed a.t- zts peak, This translates to one occu ied space for ever. f ou~ r theater seats . ~ p y This occurred a.n the summer of 1906 ~~hen each screen was.sho~in a o ular Movie. The thea g p p ter owner indicated he is building a theater in T ler y at present using ~ parking ratio o~ one space per five seats... He further indicated that the theater industry. has no standard that he is..mare of for stand-alone facilities with multi le p screens. REQUIREMENTS. CJF OTHER CITIES several other Texas cities were contacted to determine their parking requiremen The results-indicated that re urements q range from one spade per three seats t~o one space er four seats lus an em l ~ ~ p p. p oyes requirement. A l~.st of the cities contacted is given a.n Table 1 below. Table l Motion Picture Theater Parking Requirements City Parking Requirement ..~. - -- Arlington E1 Pasa Hu~tsv~.lle Lubbock San Marcos Nac®gdoches l space / 4 seats. ~a .. ~~ ~~ ~~ (.25 spaces /seat) ~r ,~ ~~ ~~ ro Fort forth Austin Canyon Irving l space / 4 seats ~- 1 space / 4:employees 1 space / 3 seats (e33 spaces / seat ~~ ~a n ~~ Sourced College Station Planning Division telephone survey, 12-80 2 _. z OTHER SOURCES Teo other sources sere reviewed. The first i~ an informational report. published by the Institute ®f Transportatian Engineers. (2) This report is a compilation of data fror~ surreys of variou parking generators. In January of 1985 23`differ~nt movie cinemas were surveyed to determine the range of occupied pa,rk~ing spaces per seat in the theater and the average number bf occlzpied spaces per seat. One criteria for a site to be surveyed was that ~.t be a f reestandng, s~.ngle 'land use; i~ this ease astand-alone movie cinet~ae The results are in Table 2 Table 2 A Survey of Occu~~d Parking Spaces peg Seat - for r~ovie Ciner~a . Parking Rates Average (parl~ing spaces p~r~theater.seat) Theater Average Range Size Weekday rates .21 .06 - .46 1,649 seats Saturday rates .25 e11 - .42 1,.661 seats Sunday rates .ll .05 - .17 1,453 seats Parking Generation. An Interim Report, 1985 The second source suggests parking- iradiees for stand-alone. u~>es. It is based on a study f®r the Urban Land Institute using data from the Institute of Transportat®n Engineers and The Traffic Institute. It suggests a parking requirer~ent for astand-alone theater of 0.3 parking spaces per seat (one space per 3.3 theater seats. (3) EXAMPLE In order to fu11y see the impact of the range of requirements an eXample belo~v applies various parJ~ingrequrements to a 1500 seat theater facility. 1500 SEAT THEATER.FAcILITY PARKING REQUIREMENT ~ SPACES REQUIRED 1 space / 4 seats (.25 spaces / seat) 375 1 space / 3.3 seats (.30 spaces / seat) 450 1 space / 3 seats (.33 spaces / seat) 500 1 space / 2.5 seats (.40 spaces / seat) 600* College Station's current requirement 3 CONCLUSION There is no distinction jade bet~een single screen and multi-r screen facilities in the cities contacted. The suggestion presented seems rea.so~able that a. multi-screen facility will rarely have all seats full Whereas a single screen facil~~ might often have a ~u11 house. It eems unlil~ely tha.~ single ecreen faci ides will be built anymore a.s the trend is t® the mult~.- ~creen concept. Although theaters are ..being located in shopping centers and enelo~ed malls it is likely that stand-alone facilities gill continue to be built College Station's ~arka.ng requirement for stand-alone theaters is high ~ahen dompared to the sources in~testigated: 4 Endnotes 1 The Community ~uild~r°s Handb®®k ~Urba~n Land Institute, 196}, p. 334 2 Perking Generation: An Interim Rep®rt Institute of Transp®rtation ~ngine~rs, 195} p. 460 3 ~ergil G. Storer and Frank J. Koepke, Transportation and ..Land Deve~.opmer~t ~Ne~ Jersey: Prentice Hall, 19~~) , ~. 185 5 COLLEGE ST AS :(409) 764-3500 J~n~e,~~ G~~ ~ ~ ~9 ' MEORA~D~t~M Tq; P1~n~.in '~ani~ C~~~~.~s~.~on F~~s Jane ~. Kee $ en~~~ Flar~ner RED P~ap~~ed ~rdil~~n~e A~~nd~~nt -~ Theater Pa~~ing Req~ire~en~t~ Attached is the proposed amend~ent rei~ti~e tc~ the p~~kin~ ~~ ~eq~ir~rnent f~~ r~ot~.on picture hc~u~e~ This amend~ent re~~ects the change ~~ directed by ,the ~a~:in~~ion ~t the meeting of J.,~n~~~y 5, 1~~r The pr~p~sed par~in~ re~~irement i~ ane parkin ~pa~e ~'~~ every 4 theater ~ea~~a The eu~rent requirement is ane p~rir~~ ~a~~ Or e~er~ 2.5 theater ~e~ats~ If ~ppro~~l a~ ~ecom~ended the ~~e~.dm~nt ~.il be f0rw~rdedl to the o~~.ci ~ at them ~neetin Feh~uary ~ ~ ~ 9~ Horne of Texas A & ~lniversity CITY OF COLLEGE STATIOI`I P O. BOX 9960 1101 TEXAS AVENUE COLLEGE STATION. TEXAS 77842-0960 _ _~; ~w _ _ m . __ _ ..., .__ ?'~ _I i PLA~[~NIR~~ C~I~SIC~ - ~ost office B~o~c_ 9860 11~~ Texas Avenue ~o~leg~ Station, texas 77842-0960 ~t~p9~ 764-3570 C~~to~b~~~ 2 ~ , ~ ~~ ~ a T~~ Pl~r~ninc~ & Z~ninc~ C~mm~~_i~r ' J~n~ .R ~ K~ enidr Pl~nne~ F~t~M I~in ~e ~ir~~nen~~ ~~r ~M~~ic~n Pi~~~zre ~'hea~e~:~~ '' RE . Per ~ ~ ~.~ ~. - _:~ ~ - r~eived ~~~ regt~ets, ~~e verbally ~~d ~~~~ in The ~~aff hay ' in that the City c~n~d~~° r~~ri~ing its p~rkn+g re~~irement ~~it ~' ~ e uirem~ent i~ ~n~ ~~r mat~n ~~ure-~he~ter~4 The current r ~ ~rl~in s ice per 2 ~ 5 ~~at '~h~ ~~:af f cer~~acted ~e~~r~;1 other ry • ` ~ ~a p~ygy ~^ ~°p y~ ' ~el~ ~rk7 r~n ~lt ~L V~ ~~~e M7~~Ve V~ -ri.els~. ~ln ~Gil~ 4,~LAld~ ~S~rJ1.Ld8 re~~~r~ ~~~ to one ~p~ce per 4 seats , indicating tY~et perhaps per 3.5 s ~c~rs is hih~ -cm~nisie~ ~eel~, t~ia~ b~s~d cn t~s_ preli~inaxy If the C ' pest atin ~n ordinance am~ndm~nt n~ic~ht be in girder, tie ~.n ~ , staff will bcin the process. i ,,i 1 WILLIAM ®. FITCH Investments -Management 2108 SOUTHWOOD DR. OFFICE (449) 693.9]L12 COLLEGE STATION, TEXAS 77840 October 26, 1988 Mr. Jim Calloway City of College Station Planning Division P. o. Box 9960 College Station, TX 77840 Re; College Station par:~:ing requirements for Motion Picture House. dear ~Ji~; ~'he Motion P~turE= zr~d~s~r~r has underdone a transisti~on from the one large dud-t~ri~m and. screen concept to; the multi--screen theater with ~ cor~m~n lobby, projection booth and vending area . the auditor'~tn~s can range anywhere from 15q seats to 4QQ seats de~~nding on the operator. Because of phis change the parking requirements in College Station as they pertain to a motion picture house needs to be carefully analyzed. Accordngto the present e~dnance, if a movie house has 1,500 seats the ~arkn~ spaces ~eq~ured would-be 600 spaces or approximately six ate, depending on the layout. V~hat, needs to be analyzes is ~'~ie actu~.l occupancy of all 1, 500 seats given one auditorium or f auditoriums. Chances are with a block buster movie opening in a. one screen theater with 1,500 seats available -.all seats will be occupied. Take the same movie and open it in a five ~cr~en theater -that .one audi- Corium will be full but the remaining screens with a less popular movie wil-1 not. Thus the impact on the paring lot will_be far less with a multi-screen theater than a one screen theater. The ordinance before it was changed in 1986 was 3.0 seats to every harking space. 'the present ordinance is .~ times the number of Heats which converts to 2.5 seats to every parking space , TQ m.y knowledge there was no~ signzficant reason or change that.. w~u-ld initiate the. ncr~~,~e off' parking for a motion picture house in College Station. Mr. Jim Calloway October 26r 1988 Page two zf there has..been a parking problem with an existing theater in College Station it is safe to say that other high traffic generators in close proximity of the theater had a helping hand in causing the coneston. If a movie house has an exclusive parking lot where very li tle or no overflow parking wi l occur from adjacent users then I think it would b~ appropriate to consider a ess strn- gent ratio for the parking requirements. I would like to initiate with the City a fact finding ..plan that gathers data from College Station ..and other compa~- rable cities that- will assist in e~r~.l~~uatng .t~~e.,:p~:~~ir~g :~re- quirements for a motion picture house. . Sincerely w W. Hansen SWIG /mk