On Sunday I visited family on the Gold Coast. I picked up a friend, I'll call her Peppermint Pattie, after the Peanuts character. PP is 10 going on 11 (or possibly much older than that), and a great companion. MDFD was supposed to come too, but she'd just got back from visitin her blood family interstate so she was a bit tired and decided to stay home.
I picked PP up on the road and we were off down the coast at about 9:30 or so.
Along the highway to the coast there was some delay so we turned off to go to Southport, way up at about exit 40 something. Then I had to get my Navman going again, it's been sitting in the console for months as I haven't needed it, and the windscreen fitting for it wasn't working...
We managed to bypass the motorway holdup and were back on track pretty soon after our detour.
After the obligatory tour of the rellies' yard and garden, and remarking on improvements and plant growth (I had left the frangipani cuttings I'd selected for them at home der!), we decided to do the girly thing and go shopping, and have lunch at the new shopping centre.
Robina is the local shopping centre, wow! It's huge now. The parking arrangements are pretty high tech. At the entrance to the carpark and at every intersection at the end of each row
an electronic sign shows an arrow and a number, this is the number of carparks and the arrow indicates the direction they are in.
At the end of each carpark bay there is a light, it is red when the bay is full, and green when the bay is empty. (Sorry about the blurry photos!) Certainly saves driving around and around the carpark looking for a spot, and this carpark was very full!
9 comments:
Wow! That's just brilliant. Haven't heard of anything like that here in Perth. Not surprising, really. One of the first things that struck me when I arrived here in '89 (aside from lack of graffiti but that didn't last long) was that all of the shopping centre car parks were uncovered in the blazing sun - acres of them.
There are a few multi-level car parks in the CBD and some shopping centres have added covered parking since but you've got to be very early or very lucky to find a spot.
The first time I used one of the CBD car parks (in '89) I had a $50 note at the ready when I got to the exit after parking for about three hours. The attendant gave me a funny look and said, "Haven't you got anything smaller"? I looked at the screen on his cash register thingy and there was the grand sum of $1. I was stunned. A few weeks before I left Sydney I'd parked for two hours in a CBD car park and was charged $28.
Even now, though Perth people whinge about parking fees, they are nothing like those of the eastern states. And no toll roads either. There are some advantages in living sooo twenty years ago.
Regards
Sandi
I built that......wooo hoooo.....really...i actually built that (well the company i work for did) :)
Hi Sandi
I never parked in Sydney city ever... not on my own anyway...
But I lived in Brisbane in the late 80s and I worked in Spring Hill, a city suburb I suppose you'd call it a street away from the city. Anyway, it used to cost me $4/day for early bird parking at Myer when I first arrived and actually worked in Margaret Street in 1986. Then I got a job in Spring Hill and it cost me $2 per day to park across the road and by the time I left that job in 1990 it was $4 a day!
Hi Carpe.
It's pretty flash... I pondered what it cost for the parking indicators... just curious. The SIL and PP and I were very impressed with the system, but we were also amazed at the amount of traffic in the shopping centre on Sunday at about midday. The marble floors are flash, too. A lot of it's not finished yet, they're still fitting out their shops.
Oh, and the food court is amazing, and HUGE, and has a great variety.
Westfield in Chatswood has it - I love it. Every car park should have it.
They have.....cars.....in Perth?
(I'm allowed to make fun of the place - I grew up there).
That's OK, Boab, I didn't. Within a year of my arrival here there was a sudden spate of school fires, set by kids - just like the Sydney of 15-20 years before. I said to my Perth friends at the time, "Now watch for the graffiti". Graffiti soon started to appear everywhere. Just like Sydney of 15-20 years before.
And so it continues.
Regards
Sandi
Wow, love that car park, there is nothing worse then driving from floor to floor in Adelaide trying to find a place to park.
In our Country town, the bigger shopping complex is 25-30 minutes away and you park in the sun, since temps can rise in Summer to way over the 40 mark, it is just plain silly.
Good one Carpe.
We, on the other hand, allow the rains to gently rinse our cars in the open lots.
Cheers
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