Functional Design Review for Parking Garages

A functional design review is a parking specialist’s check of drawings for how a facility will work in use, covering circulation, geometry, queuing, pedestrian routes, wayfinding, equipment locations and maintenance access, separate from code and structural review.

At a glance

When: At each design milestone, and on every design-build submittal before design freeze
Checks: Function and operation, not code compliance
Key fact: Every dead end, reversal or blind turn should have a reason written on the drawing

Typical findings on a parking plan: things a code check passes but a driver, a walker or an operator would trip over. Illustrative.

Code reviews ask whether a building is safe and legal. Structural reviews ask whether it will stand. A functional review asks whether it will work on a busy Friday for a first-time visitor, a staff member and the technician who has to fix a camera without closing the only exit lane.

What reviewers look for

Driveways against signals, turn restrictions, bike lanes, sidewalks and transit stops, and enough reservoir space.
Circulation: one-way or two-way, dead ends, reversals, sight lines and conflicts between entering and exiting traffic.
Geometry: stall and aisle dimensions, turning radii, ramp slopes, columns against doors and stalls, and vertical clearance.
Pedestrian routes to stairs and elevators that never cross a queue blindly.
Islands, conduit and mounting points for PARCS, LPR, guidance and EV charging.
Maintenance access: can each device, light and drain be serviced without closing a critical lane?

When it happens

At concept, schematic, design development and construction documents, and on each design-build submittal before design freeze. Late review still finds problems; it just finds them when fixing them costs more, as the MacLeamy curve predicts.

The Parkonomics view

Make the review independent and give it teeth: a written scope, a milestone schedule and a response log that the design team must close. A reviewer who works for the owner, not the designer, is the only one with no reason to wave a problem through.

Further reading: Designed to Park, or Designed to Impress?