The Office 2: The Garage
Posted on | September 22, 2007 at 10:25 am | 1 Comment
This is the second in a series of entries about my new place of work. I still work at the same company where I’ve worked for over nine years, but now I’m working at a different location that is in the heart of Denver and is around twice as far from home as the original building. Yesterday’s entry was on the perils of the longer commute. Today, I cover the parking garage. The Parking Garage From Hell.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m really thankful for the parking garage. This is the first building I’ve ever worked in, aside from home, where there’s a roof over my car. And that’s very cool, and much better than the alternatives. Parking spaces are reserved (for the most part), my company pays the fee to the building owner, and you need a badge to get into the reserved area of the garage. For the first couple of months down here, my assigned spot was on the unprotected roof. But then one of my co-workers moved out of state (while remaining on the project) and I got his covered space. A covered parking area is very important in Denver, especially during the early and late summer hail seasons. I’ve had two different cars nearly totaled by hailstorms at work, and I prefer that fate not befall the Prius. Winters can also be pretty harsh on cars parked outside, and it will be really nice to not have to brush the car off during a snowstorm once winter gets going.
But… Oh. My. God. The architect who designed this garage should be shot. (Ironic, since there are some architectural firms in this office building.) It’s attached to the building and is not a separate structure. There are actually two garages – one on the side and one under the building, but they both have similar problems. I’m in the one on the side. It has the most closely packed parking spaces I’ve ever seen in such a garage, probably because they keep running out of spaces and have to make more by making the existing ones smaller. There are huge support pillars every three spaces, and they really get in the way. I can’t quite figure out why so many pillars are needed and why they are so big. The turns for the level transitions are extremely tight. But worst of all, the driving (center) lane is very narrow. There is only room for one car to traverse it, so if two cars are going in opposite directions, one of them must back up or pull into an empty space temporarily.
So the net effect is that if you drive anything bigger than a Mini Cooper, and the spaces next to you are occupied (or you’re next to a pillar, which most spaces are), you have to do a heck of a maneuvering job. It’s like trying to parallel park in a space on the street that’s not much bigger than your car length. This can take minutes. I think some people come to work early just so they can park before the person in the space next to them shows up. Luckily, the Prius is fairly small and maneuverable, so I don’t have as many parking problems as some. The Acura RSX was smaller but somehow not as maneuverable. The people in big cars and SUVs have the most trouble, of course. One of my co-workers with a good sized (but not giant) pickup is in a tight space on the inside turn of a level, between a pillar on the outside and a PT Cruiser in the space on the inside. So he takes the bus to work most days. I tried parking in his space a few times, back when I had the uncovered spot, and it took a lot of maneuvering with the Prius. And once I was in, the pillar blocked my door and I couldn’t get out of the car. Brilliant.
My space is on the same level as my office, so at least I don’t have to use the elevator. However, my parking spot is at one extreme end of the building and the office is on the other end, so it’s a looong walk each morning with my laptop and heavy backpack from one side of the building to the other. That adds another couple of minutes onto the commute.
In conclusion, I’m really grateful to have a parking garage to park my car in while at work. But somewhere there’s an architect who needs a disemboweling. Or at least a spanking.
Next: The Facilities
Pet Peeve Of The Day: You have to ask??
Latre.
Comments
One Response to “The Office 2: The Garage”
September 23rd, 2007 @ 8:41 am
Covered parking is a nice perk, but I destroyed one side of my car parking to close to a column. $500 worth of bodywork. Very painful to my wallet.