They’re dark, desolate, and frequently dirty—it can be hard to think of underground parking garages as anything other than concrete wastelands. But what if these cramped, neglected spaces were actually untapped jewels of real estate?

Parking garages run rampant, especially in Los Angeles. According to Gensler's co-CEO Andy Cohen there are 500 million parking spaces in the United States. “Think about all that real estate, all that attention to parking, that could be revitalized and reused for the future of our cities.”...

It doesn’t look like much from the outside. But as they say, you can’t always judge a book by its cover. And more interesting design flashes take over inside The Summit, A Dolce Hotel, featuring a

The Broadway Autopark, a 44-unit residential complex, opened on April 1. The apartments were built into the former Knightley's Parking Garage at 303 S. Broadway in downtown Wichita. The parking garage has been converted into apartments.

Parking takes up an extraordinary amount of space in cities. These projects are making it easier to convert it to something more useful than car storage.

Sweeping conclusions about the location and travel desires of millennials may be premature