How much do you think about parking?

Do you check on the parking situation on Google maps before going to an 

event? Then debate between a garage near your destination or walking the length of a sunbaked parking lot?

In "Paved Paradise: How Parking Explains the World," Slate staff writer Henry Grabar uses a beguiling and absurdly hilarious mix of history, politics, and reportage to brilliantly survey the nation’s parking management, revealing how the compulsion for car storage has exacerbated some of our most acute problems— from housing affordability to the accelerating global climate disaster—and, ultimately, how we can free our cities from park­ing’s cruel yoke.

Preceding the program, the county's Parking and Curb Space Management team will host an Open House to learn more about the next phase in the Parking Performance Pilot project in Arlington.

The author conversation will be followed by an audience Q&A and book signing.

Registration Recommended: First-come, first-served seating. By registering, you will receive event updates.

PARK(ing) Day is a community collaboration to temporarily transform curbside parking spaces into small parks to elicit reconsideration of the term "public space."

Applications are now being accepted for PARK(ing) Day 2025, on Thursday, Oct. 2.

Get a group together and submit your plan to transform a drab slab of curbside into a temporary public oasis. Learn more on the program page.