Nowhere to park: The gap between planning and real life
Tuesday, 24 March 2026
Are we building homes that Kiwis want to live in? Perhaps not.
As intensification reshapes suburbs across the country, new research suggests a growing disconnect between how cities are being designed — and how people actually live.
With terraces and apartments replacing standalone homes and councils moving away from minimum parking requirements, developers are increasingly building with fewer — or no — off-street car parks. But the reality on the ground tells a different story: The vast majority of New Zealand households still rely on cars.
According to 2023 Census data, 93% of households have at least one vehicle, and 60% have two or more.
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Last year LJ Hooker released a survey showing two thirds of buyers would not consider buying a home without a lawn. Now they are looking at car numbers and what consumers want.
Head of research Mathew Tiller said the gap between planning and behaviour was is becoming harder to ignore.
He said liveability should not be judged by housing numbers alone.
“A liveable city is not just about squeezing more homes into a suburb. It is about whether people can move around easily, enjoy where they live, access the services they need and feel safe and comfortable in their neighbourhood,” Tiller said.
“We continue to approve homes without sufficient off-street parking, even though most households own multiple vehicles,” he said.
In 2022, under the National Policy Statement on Urban Development, councils were required to remove minimum car parking requirements from district plans in most urban areas meaning developers were generally no longer mandated to provide a set number of off-street parks per dwelling, except for accessible parking.
In Auckland, plan change 120 is set to enable more townhouses in Auckland’s inner suburbs and allow for six to 15-storey apartment buildings along rail lines and some bus routes.
A record 10,500 submissions were received from supercity residents - more than for the original Unitary Plan.
Tiller said although councils could not require minimum numbers of parks, design standards still applied when parking was provided. The typical minimum residential parking bay dimensions are approximately 2.4 metres wide by 5 to 5.4 metres long. These standards reflect baseline functionality, not generous sizing.
“The removal of minimum parking numbers does not remove the need for functional design,” Tiller said. “If a space is too small for modern vehicles, it will not be used as intended and the pressure simply shifts back onto the street.”
The result was increasingly visible in fast-growing suburbs across the country, where streets are lined with parked cars, narrowing roads and creating congestion.
“When developments lack adequate on-site parking, the pressure doesn’t disappear — it shifts onto the street,” Tiller said.
That has flow-on effects for safety and functionality, from reduced visibility for drivers and pedestrians to difficulties for emergency services navigating tight, car-lined streets.
How an area works in day-to-day life is key.
“It is about the day-to-day experience of living in a suburb. Can parents walk safely with their children? Do streets feel open and functional rather than congested? Do people have enough space to relax and enjoy where they live?” Tiller said.
In parts of Auckland undergoing rapid intensification, residents were already reporting streets that function more as parking zones than transport corridors.
“Streets are meant to move people safely, not store vehicles,” Tiller said.
The shift away from parking requirements stems from 2022 planning reforms, which removed minimum parking rules in most urban areas in a bid to encourage density and reduce car dependence.
But Tiller said the transition was being pushed ahead of the infrastructure needed to support it.
“There is a strong case for less parking in areas close to rapid transit, but outside those locations it is unrealistic to assume households will suddenly stop owning cars,” he said.
The issue was likely to become more pronounced as electric vehicle uptake grew, with off-street parking increasingly tied to the ability to charge at home.
“A car space is no longer just somewhere to leave the car — it becomes part of how a household powers its day-to-day transport,” Tiller said.
Without dedicated off-street parking, some households may find EV ownership impractical, relying on public charging or running cables across footpaths to street-parked cars.
While the research also highlights a strong preference for green space — with two-thirds of New Zealanders unwilling to buy a home without a garden — Tiller said the broader issue was one of balance.
He said the desire for a garden had not disappeared. Even as cities grow upward and inward, most New Zealanders still valued having their own piece of outdoor space, whether that is for children, pets, entertaining or simply wellbeing.
Beyond that green spaces have other benefits like urban cooling and heat mitigation, stormwater absorption and improved mental wellbeing and developers needed to consider the importance Kiwis place on the outdoors.
“A liveable city is not just about how many homes we build. It is about whether those homes work in practice,” he said.
That included access to outdoor space, functional streets and transport options that reflected how people actually moved around.
As Auckland — and other growing centres — continue to densify, Tiller said getting that balance right would be critical.
“Density, green space and infrastructure should work together,” he said.
“If we get that wrong, we risk creating neighbourhoods that look efficient on paper, but don’t function well for the people living in them.”
Tiller said a city that met its housing targets but compromised on safety, functionality and everyday liveability had not truly succeeded.