Parking Garages are designed so that the flow between vehicles can be created using interior ramps, exterior ramps, vehicle lifts or elevators. The actual design of the parking garage depends commonly on where it is located, how many cars it is meant to hold, and what sort of land it is built on. Parking garages that are built on sloping land typically have split-levels. It has been only in the past recent years that many parking garages have been created from independent buildings for that use only, which allows for longer floor spans and accommodations for a greater number of vehicles. Parking garages are also commonly built to serve residential areas like apartment and business complexes, they can be built next to the building they are meant to accompany, below it as in on the first and sometimes second floor of an apartment complex, or often underground to serve as part of the basement of a building.



In the United States the common terms for these structures are Parking Garage, Parking Structure, Parking, Deck and Parkade, the term ?parking ramp? is also used, commonly in the upper Midwest, including Wisconsin and Minnesota, but also as far east as Buffalo, and New York, however in the United Kingdom, Hong Kong and Singapore, the term ?Multi-Story Car Park? is used. Building codes in the United States use the term ?Open parking structure? relating to a structure designed for storing cars, they are created to have openings in the walls which allow filtering of fresh air in order to disperse car exhaust and fire fumes.

Parking garages that are meant to serve shopping malls are usually built adjacent to a multi-story mall in an attempt to create easier access to various floors of the mall to various floors of the parking garage. The Mall of America in Bloomington, Minnesota for instance, has two large that are attached to the building at both the eastern and western ends of the mall.

Parking Garages for casinos are built adjacent to the casino. Parking garages for hospitals are usually connected to the hospital. Parking Garages for airports are also typically connected to the airport. Parking garages for universities and colleges are built to accommodate growth of student enrollment.

Mixed-use parking structure construction is also becoming more popular, especially where public dollars are allocated. Mixed-use helps generate tax revenue for cities and localities. Instead of parking garage serving a single-purpose, retail and commercial space are incorporated into the structure.