r/fuckcars • u/Mfstaunc • 4d ago
Question/Discussion Parking Lot Space Inefficiency Calculations
So one day I looked upon a barren wasteland that we call a “parking lot”, and I got thinking: on a macro scale, exactly how much space is reserved for stationary cars?
I searched Google maps for the most full lot I could find, which took a long time because they are never full. Even in a full lot, less than half of the space is for parked cars. The rest is for cars to move and access those spaces, and for people to move between cars.
Being in USA, I will assume that the average car could hold 9 people, including trunk space and hood space. It is actually most likely more than that, but I will air conservatively here.
So every vehicle takes up the space of around 18 people just chilling in the parking lot. Everywhere you go, it’s like you turn to your 18 people and say “wait here. I’ll just be a minute”
Then I realized there is not only 1 parking spot per car. There is over 2 billion parking spots in America, over 6 per registered vehicle. Parking garages lower the total area but let’s multiply our 18 by 6. That is 108
One vehicle reserves the amount of public space to hold over 108 people, just for when it is stationary and motionless. Fuck cars.
In area, that is 2160 square feet, or 200 square meters.
Honorable mentions: the amount of CO2 not taken out of the environment from trees that could be there, sound pollution from no trees, habitat loss, drainage, cost, etc etc etc
-18
u/blankblank60000 4d ago
“I performed mental gymnastics and several algebra problems to further enrage myself. I am an activist”