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Parking Madness Elite Eight Matchup: Dallas vs. Jacksonville

We're on to round two of Parking Madness, our search for the worst parking crater in North America. And I have to say, the parking craters in this match do seem to have descended to a new level of horribleness.

We’re on to round two of Parking Madness, our search for the worst parking crater in North America. And I have to say, the parking craters in this match do seem to have descended to a new level of horribleness.

Dallas and Jacksonville are both such overachieving parking cities, it’s almost a shame they meet so soon. But them’s the breaks. Let’s see which is worse. The winner of this match will go onto the final four competition for the Golden Crater.

First, here’s Dallas:

original

We swapped out the picture we used in the last round for one that our readers assure us is more up to date. There has been a little bit of infill development since the last one was taken. But the area can’t attract unsubsidized private development, according to Patrick Kennedy of Walkable Dallas-Fort Worth, because it’s been so blighted by I-345, which you can see on right edge of the photo. Kennedy has been one of the loudest advocates for tearing down the freeway.

Now, let’s look at Jacksonville:

jacksonville1

This area whomped Calgary’s impressive crater in our first round, demonstrating the United States’s clear dominance in the realm of parking wastelands. It helps that this whole area is divided by highways like pieces of a pie. Urban landscapes degraded by highways and filled in by parking have become an all-too-common theme in this competition.

Let us know which place you judge to be most offensive, below:

[poll id=”64″]

Picture 17

Photo of Angie Schmitt
Angie is a Cleveland-based writer with a background in planning and newspaper reporting. She has been writing about cities for Streetsblog for six years.

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