I have lived in Carrollton for 13 years total; to some, that number might be small, but for me, it’s quite large considering I am only 15 years old. Everything that goes on in my life pretty much happens in Carrollton; activities ranging from eating, shopping, golfing, playing baseball, and much more go on in the city. The mode of transportation I take to get to these places is normally by car, 95% of the time.

When I travel by car, I normally just think of the basics: where I am leaving from, where I am headed to, and how long it will take to get there. However, once you get to that location, is the car really the only thing responsible for you being there? No, it is not.

I haven’t noticed the one crucial thing that controls where the cars go and how the city flows until now: parking. You might think it sounds pointless or dumb to even think about, but parking truly plays a large role in the engineering and architecture of the city of Carrollton itself.

You might think that houses, office buildings, shops, and parks control the place you live or where you gather; however, there is one key factor that is being left out here that could be a determining factor. The idea of parking being essential in determining the layout of a place is heavily conveyed in the book “Paved Paradise” by Henry Grabar, which talks about how American cities have become obsessed with parking. This is seen in this quote from the book where Grabar says, “In fact, I’ve come to the conclusion that parking is the primary determinant of the way the place you live looks, feels, and functions.” By this, he means that long before architects design buildings or planners lay out public parks, mandatory parking minimums and asphalt lots have already decided how far apart our destinations sit, how walkable our neighborhoods are, and how accessible our communities feel.

While this quote is from a book that you might not have read, there are many ways close to you that show and display the importance of parking. Personally, the importance of parking was conveyed to me face to face at the same exact time I was in the process of reading Paved Paradise.

Fortunately enough, the AP Language curriculum at Carrollton High School asked Carrollton’s own Mr. David Brooks to come in and present to the classes. During the presentation by Mr. Brooks, he covered a vast amount of topics concerning the city of Carrollton. He is quite knowledgeable on this subject, considering he is the current city manager, former assistant city manager, and former Carrollton High principal.

As I said previously, as a group, we as classes had a variety of discussions about the things going on in our city- Carrollton, Ga. But the one that stuck out to me the most was, you guessed it, parking. I am a sophomore student who loves the study of engineering, architecture, and just construction in general. So you could imagine, every word he said that involved these studies, I paid attention to heavily, and for a good reason: parking, specifically construction and design, stood out to me the most. While construction in general was the main topic of the discussion, another huge chunk of what was spoken about was the tourism that goes on in the city of Carrollton.

“The city of Carrollton attracts thousands and thousands of tourists every week, month, and year. When these people come to Carrollton in their cars, they need somewhere to park their cars and leave them. They do not want to have to move it constantly; they want to park it and leave it”. These were words said by Mr. Brooks on the importance of parking in Carrollton. And more specifically, the massive parking deck located on the square. The parking deck is one of, if not the largest, places for housing cars in the city. The significance of the parking deck, and all parking spots in Carrollton, is that the layout and capacity of Carrollton’s parking infrastructure play a far more defining role in how the city functions than the design of any individual building.

So, I’ve said all this to say.

Parking is not something you think about every day, or maybe even at all. However, parking your car is a huge factor in my city of Carrollton and every other city around the world. The importance of parking might not always be highlighted in bold letters right in front of your face. Although it is my promise to you, if you look for it, you will find it.