Why losing your car in a car park is a universal experience

We’ve all been there. You enter the carpark, looking for the Green Possum level you parked on. Green Possum level has somehow ceased to exist in the time you were away. You walk to the Blue Wombat level and start looking around, frustration levels rising, pressing your key fob and desperately waiting for a blip from your car so you can get home and take your shoes off, already. Resignation sets in. This is your life now. Your mind has become an infinite carpark; your car itself has vanished.

Sound familiar? We exaggerate, of course. But losing a car is a genuinely annoying experience. Whether it’s in a multi-storey carpark or a sprawling array at the shops, we’ve all lost our car (and maybe our minds) at some point.

Why do we lose our cars?

We don’t really need to delve into the science journals to understand why losing a car is a universal experience. There are a bunch of obvious factors at play:

• Car parks are increasingly large, yet always unique in layout
• Shops and other venues are often designed to lose time in, and we come out discombobulated
• Around four in every five of the world’s cars are either grey, silver, white or black, so lots of them blend right into the crowd.

Honestly, it’s a miracle we ever find our cars at all.

The worst car parks for lost cars

A large car park in the CBD can be a challenging memory test that a lot of us are bound to fail. Which street corner? Which level? Are we even in the right city at this point?!

A large shopping centre car park can be a nightmare. You’d better hope your phone has been tracking your every move, so you can beg it for assistance when you’ve walked down your fourth escalator of the hour.

The airport carpark is another culprit – made worse if you’ve been away for days or weeks, or have been trying to find a jet-lagged relative in the crowd. Then there’s the added pressure of getting out of the carpark before you get charged another bazillion dollars.

But if you think the everyday carpark is bad, just imagine navigating the largest parking lot in the world. The West Edmonton Mall in Canada has enough spaces for 20,000 vehicles, with overflow for another 10,000.

Our 10 tips to avoid losing your car in a parking lot

Here are a handful of parking tips, from the sensible to not-so-sensible:

• Get savvy with your phone and pin your parking spot on the map.
• Add a smart tag to your glove box so your car is always trackable.
• Choose the brightest colour you can as you shop used cars online. Vivid yellow, anyone?
• Add a flag to your car, a la a presidential convoy.
• Choose a distinctive make and model when buying a vehicle, like a Lambo, or a tractor.
• Park in the exact same spot every time, bringing your own traffic cones to block others while you’re away.
• Spray paint your car roof with a neon colour. This only works until everyone decides to do it.
• Trail a string behind you as you take the lift and do your shopping.
• Do your shopping several hours away in a country town, where there are more kangaroos than cars.
• Park the car once and accept defeat, sacrificing your vehicle to the parking gods.

All very smart and practical options. Now, to find the solution to lost car keys.