I’ve been thinking about parking spaces…
Per specifications from St. Louis County, Fenton, Maryland Heights as well as the national standard, a parking space ought to be nine feet wide.
Oh, several places, such as Clayton, have in their codes that a space may be narrower than nine feet ], but that’s supposed to be a special exemption and not the rule.
Only it’s not.
A handy tool on my latest iPhone is a measurement app. Tied to the camera, I can push a couple of buttons and get a pretty precise measurement in a second. For example, the grocery store parking lot by my house has pretty consistent parking spaces, all eight and a half feet wide (going from outer edge of one white strip to the outer edge of the next). Using the app on other lots finds a lot of spaces trim the width by a few inches to a foot.
Meanwhile, my 2009 Silverado – without its mirrors – is 79.9 inches (just over six and a half feet) wide: with the mirrors she’s just over 101 inches, or, 8.42 feet wide.
Now, many SUV’s, crossovers and other pick-up trucks run about 80 inches wide (without mirrors). As any trip to the grocers shows, big vehicles are very popular. Note that General Motors just killed several medium size sedans yet continues to make all the big SUVs and pick-ups they can. I understand, that’s what selling. (For the record, my daughter recently traded her cute little Buick Verano for a large-dog friendly Buick SUV.)
Still, bigger vehicles and “traditional” sized (at best) parking spaces seldom mesh.
Again, putting a truck which, with modest mirrors, takes-up 8.42 feet in an 8.5 feet wide space means the doors won’t open when a similar sized vehicle gets parked next to it.
If you believe in market forces and capitalism, after years of folks buying larger vehicles, retailers by now ought to be courting customers with wider parking spaces. Bigger spaces make the shopping experience better, thereby encouraging the spending of money. Costco understands this (ten feet wide with breathing space between spaces). Most retailers don’t.
You see, despite the way markets ought to work, institutions get all gummed-up by tradition, by that “this is how we’ve always done it” mentality. Parking spaces have always been nine feet wide, so, parking spaces will always be nine feet wide.
Likewise, if spaces should be nine feet wide but a retailer can get five more spaces per row by going to 8½ feet, well, what’s six inches among friends?
Remember last month’s election here in Missouri?
Progressive ideas – a higher minimum wage and redistricting reform – won by great margins. Yet, many of the same people who voted for the propositions went solidly for Republicans on the rest of their ballots.
Why? Probably because “this is how we’ve always done it” requires them to vote Republican.
Changing minds, like changing the size of parking spaces, won’t happen quickly. Those of us wanting a better, more humane Missouri have to think – and act – over the long haul, over years and maybe a decade or two. The trick is to work at change every day.
Wondering why I’m so interested in parking spaces? When I go to the store I park a pretty good ways from the door where, most of the time, I don’t crowd others. A few weeks back, alas, I parked in the empty and came out to find my truck penned-in tight on both sides.
No biggie. I put the cart behind the truck and placed my bags on the passenger seat one at a time, through the window.
A few days later I noticed that someone had taken a sharp key to the lower panel on my driver’s side door. They didn’t like my truck crowding them (even though it was there first). That’s 2018 in Missouri.
Glenn
Maybe, they should make parking spaces smaller, that way, with trouble parking them anywhere, people who insist on driving around Sherman tanks will give their next purchase a second thought.
People who call themselves Dems or progressives, or liberals should practice what they preach.
I remember reading years ago that an engineer’s solution to water shortages in cities in desert areas, was to build bigger pumping stations, pipes over longer distance, and rob water from it’s natural areas. When a progressive’s solution is – “Don’t keep pumping water there at any cost – and maybe people will stop moving to those areas that HAVE NO WATER!”
You make a good point, Spark. I need to keep a truck for hauling I do (and to its credit it does burn E85 when I can find it) so I sympathize with Glenn’s position. I think Glenn’s point is that markets don’t necessarily drive goods and services that benefit the consumer. In fact, companies (and governments) by nature are resistant to change even in the face of changing demand. Changing attitudes takes time and patience. So, keep sharing your ideas about making making our world a better place.