My husband had an absolutely amazing parking experience about a year ago. He is a street poet in Nashville, TN., and he performs in a congested neighborhood that is infamous for tricky parking. You’d expect to spend around 10-15 minutes finding parking, sometimes longer if the walk from spot to destination is far. It’s bumper to bumper most of the time. God forbid you make a wrong turn, because you’ll get stuck on a side street until the dinner reservations expire. This is why it was so striking to us when he found a little gem behind the main street. The gem? A small parking lot marked with a very confusing sign: No Parking 11am - 3pm Fridays. We’d only ever noticed the “no parking” part, but that was misleading, for the sign meant no parking only during the hours of 11am-3pm and then, only on fridays! That means this lot was open to the public, free of charge, every day of the week, every hour of each day, with the small exception of four hours at midday on Friday, sitting right here under everyone’s noses. And to make matters more amazing, it was a 30 second walk to main street. 

All our days sneaking into our little paradise parking lot made us notice the people all around us, stressed and sweating over parking, just like we used to do. I couldn’t help but think: how many places is this happening all over the city? How much could change for the better about the experience of Nashville if we could solve one little problem: making parking clear and accessible to all?

And so Project ParkZen was born.