It's fair to say that the Missus and I have an aversion to multilevel parking garages with their typically labyrinthine traffic patterns and too-narrow aisles. At this particular garage, the adjacent Century 12 Theaters generate considerable traffic, and upon entering we became entangled in gridlock caused by a large number of impatient drivers attempting to arrive and depart the garage at the same time. Another problem is that the parking spaces here are too narrow to be practical for SUVs, minivans, and full-size cars. The first two spaces we attempted were so tight that we couldn't get out of our car. It was 15 minutes from the time we pulled into the garage until we finally exited on foot.
Parking in Evanston's public garages is FREE all day on Sundays and major holidays. On those days, it would seem obvious for garage operators to latch all entrance and exit gates in the open position. Well, not here. We had to take a ticket in order to raise the entry gate; and upon leaving, we had to insert the ticket to get the exit gate to open even though parking was "free." Now, that's just ... plain ... stupid. To make matters worse, exiting traffic was backed up because two of the three gates refused to open and there was no attendant in sight. read more