The Rules of the Parking Lot

There's a definite culture of the parking lot at Solana Beach, where I park in the morning. For the early train (#763), I can usually find a spot in the section closer to the station. I get there around 20 minute early, because I build in padding in case there's an accident or delay on the freeway. Like most regulars, I back into the stall, which is absurdly wide. This makes the evening getaway easier because of all the people walking through the lot--I can see them better forwards than backwards.

Once parked, I leave the radio on and use my iphone to read the news while I finish my morning tea. Generally most of the cars around me are also occupied, with people reading the paper or sipping coffee. I go down to the platform around 10 minutes before the train is due.

An hour later, on the days I catch #563 (the pseudo-express, which is proving to be rather disappointing), I have to park considerably further away, usually past the third driveway. That gets to be a pretty long schlep to the platform, which I notice in the evenings when I do the walk in reverse. On the rare days it rains in San Diego, it is particularly sucky.

We all queue up to leave --often it's faster to drive away from the station and exit one of the more distal driveways, because the first driveway is clogged with people doing pickups. Then there is a mad dash up to the freeway on-ramp so we can get home and turn around and do it all again the next day.