JPG: Stories: Photo Essay: Parking Lot 1

Parking Lot 1

By Thomas Hilly

2 Mar 2009

In most countries where cars are the dominant mode of transportation, parking lots are a feature of every city and suburban area.

The usual parking lot is paved with asphalt. Some are paved with concrete. Many are gravel lots. A few of the newer lots are surfaced with permeable paving materials.

Most spaces in normal parking lots available to the public are sized for vehicles about the size of a car. The spaces are usually arranged assuming the vehicle can back out of the parking space.

The area in parking lots is organized into parking spaces, which are generally marked with paint lines for each vehicle and driving lanes in between so that vehicles can drive into and out of the spaces. The arrangement of the parking spaces relative to the driving lanes can feature perpendicular parking spaces, angle parking, or parallel parking.

Parking lots can be small, with just parking spaces for a few vehicles, very large with spaces for thousands of vehicles, or any size in between. Small parking lots are usually near buildings for small businesses or a few apartments, although many other locations are possible. Larger parking lots can be for larger businesses or those with many customers, institutions such as offices, hospitals, museums or other tourist attractions, rest areas, strip malls, or larger apartment buildings.

At places where most visitors and employees use their car to access place, the parking lot usually takes up more land area than the buildings. This is at least true for shopping centres and office buildings, unless a multi-storey park is used.

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Hi there!

thought you might like this submission to JPG Magazine. If you do, vote it up!

http://jpgmag.com/stories/10787

Thanks,
—The JPG team

12 responses

Michael Adams gave props (2 Mar 2009):
Great idea. I love how empty they are! the inclusion of the two vs makes this story for me.
Denman said (2 Mar 2009):
great selection of images. brilliant series.
mark regester gave props (2 Mar 2009):
incredibly sterile parking lot. great series. voted
Ting Huang gave props (3 Mar 2009):
This is way cool!
visithra manikam said (5 Mar 2009):
nice work
gave props (8 Mar 2009):
very cool
Adam Wilson gave props (11 Mar 2009):
It is amazing how a series of photos can spark new interest in an otherwise dull subject. Great photos and even better series.
Chris Whitney said (13 Mar 2009):
Nice collection of images in this series.
Marco Martinez gave props (18 Mar 2009):
very nice work. i guess you could scare away the shadows we associate with parking lots. very nice, indeed.
Brian Haferkamp said (20 Apr 2009):
I like how you've taken a large space and made it even more enclosed. It wants to be large but it never feels that way to the eye. Also, nice use of the geometry of the space. I love the block feel of all the photos as well as the perspective. It's right on.
Lanis Rossi gave props (5 May 2009):
Love it. Voted!
jean-francois said (15 May 2009):
Fantastic entry ! Parking lots are usually boring but here you've made some amazing photos. I really love the atmosphere in these shots...my vote :)