Everyone once in a while the government gets something right. Living in Los Angeles, I frequently embark on perhaps one of the most difficult journeys known on Earth – commuting to Orange County. Although the journey is a mere 45 miles, the drive time can be as short as 35 minutes or as long as three hours, depending on the traffic. It's the reason Southern California residents measure driving in minutes instead of miles.

In 2018, the Orange County Transit Authority started a $2.16 billion project to add two toll/HOV lanes from northern Orange County to near the John Wayne Airport. It opened on December 1, 2023. Despite the fact that this project took nearly six years, the change was indeed significant. My first journey in the new lanes was 34 minutes shorter than the estimate from my navigation software. As I entered the toll lanes, traffic was at a complete stop across the rest of the highway. I was thrilled to have the option of spending $5 to gain an extra 30 minutes of productivity that day.

The new lanes are available to EV vehicles with an approved sticker, vehicles with 3+ passengers and those willing to pay a toll, which can be as much as $5.00, depending on the time of day. These lanes are beginning to appear on many other highways, particularly in the West. The Colorado Department of Transportation completed a massive overhaul of I-70 through Denver in the Summer of 2023 that also added toll/HOV lanes, giving drivers the option of avoiding traffic into downtown Denver in the morning and out of the city in the evenings.

Specialty lanes such as these currently cover more than 5,500 miles of highways in the United States, according to the Federal Highway Administration. This is minor compared to the 26,000 miles of full toll lanes across the nation. What makes these specialty lanes appealing is the fact that they are optional. If someone doesn't want to spend the money to save a few minutes – they don't have to. It puts the power in the hands of the consumer and enables them to prioritize cost versus time. Handing over control makes a big difference in cost perception, and it's a path that multifamily needs to follow when it comes to multifamily parking.

Many of today's parking solutions put the burden on residents. Some include a mandatory monthly fee, forcing residents to pay for an issue they may not believe exists. Parking fees also carry a negative connotation with residents viewing them as an increase in rent. To solve under-parking in a consumer-oriented way, the cure can't be more painful than the disease.

The optimal solution is to place the choice in the hands of the residents. Consumers are feeling fatigued with mandatory fees and bundling, as well as frequent incremental cost increases. Banks and airlines now rely heavily on fees to generate revenue, and it's nearly impossible to buy any kind of food without someone hitting you up for a tip. Fatigue is setting in for multifamily residents who are seeing longer lists of charges and fees appearing on monthly statements.

Rather than impose a parking fee on residents with no regard for their preferences, enable them to address parking how and when they want to and without feeling like it's a rent increase. This path is key to alleviating negative reviews, turnover and subsequent increased marketing costs associated with under-parked communities. The amount you save on empowering residents will far outweigh the cost of forcing fees on them.

A lot of people like to pile on California for the things they do, but it has been one of the first to realize that providing an option to consumers on its highways was the best choice. Rather than join other industries and try to nickel-and-dime consumers as a path for revenue gains, owners and operators need to embrace the beauty of choice.