Walking from one side of a Walmart parking lot to the other can take up to 2,000 steps.
But most shoppers rarely complain about the long journey – and that’s thanks to Walmart’s science-based design.
Urban planning experts revealed that it doesn’t feel like you’re walking a marathon because the ‘massive sight lines,’ spaces in between spots, which allow customers to have a clear view of the store no matter where they have parked.
Walmart has also scaled structures around a car strategically, like tall lamp posts and giant signage, minimizing the perception of how large the lot actually is.
The experts also noted that because the entire parking lot is dedicated to the store, shoppers do not feel as if they are going out of their way – no matter how far they park from the entrance doors.
A typical Walmart, with its parking lot, occupies a total area equal to more than a dozen football fields. And the parking lot accounts for the majority of that space
A typical Walmart, with its parking lot, occupies a total area equal to more than a dozen football fields.
And the parking lot is, on average, three times the size of the store.
Experts at Streetcraft, a media company that creates informative content about urban planning, revealed that the perceived short walk is just an illusion.
It all comes down to the differences between how parking lots and cities are set up, they explained.
In a video, a Streetcraft expert posed a hypothetical scenario in which a customer drives to Walmart, parks, and purchases groceries, towels and toothpaste.
‘You check out, go back to your car, and probably think nothing of this,’ he said.
Next, the customer drives to their city’s downtown for lunch, but has to park a few blocks away from the restaurant because all the spots directly outside are taken.
‘It might feel like you had to walk forever to get to the restaurant and back to your car, but it turns out this was actually no further than your quick trip to Walmart.’
There’s two reasons why the walk to and from the restaurant may feel longer, the expert said in the video, which was posted on the Streetcraft Instagram.
The first is the sightlines, or the line between a viewer’s eye and their destination.
Navigating Walmart ‘s enormous parking lots requires a lot of steps. But the way they are designed makes the distance from the car to the store feel shorter
In a city, sightlines are constantly obstructed by buildings, trees and other obstacles that make it difficult to see the destination until it is very close by
‘In a massive parking lot, you get a clear view of your destination as you approach it,’ he said.
This is not the case in a city, where sightlines are constantly obstructed by buildings, trees and other obstacles that make it difficult to see the destination until it is very close by.
In a parking lot, ‘Everything is scaled around the car too, whether that’s lights, signs, or even the storefronts themselves,’ the expert explained.
‘In a city though, everything becomes human scale.’
‘You pass visual cues that give you a sense of distance traveled – like trees, other people and human-sized storefronts – all of which block direct sightlines, giving it the illusion that your destination is further it might seem.’
The second reason has to do with the way emotions can sway a person’s perception of how long it takes to walk from place to place.
‘There’s also the expectation of dedicated parking. In the US, people are so used to going to a dedicated parking lot to visit one business,’ the expert explained.
‘And when we can’t park directly in front of the business, it doesn’t align with that expectation. Even if factually, parking a few blocks down is no different than just parking at the end of a Walmart parking lot.’
The frustration people might feel when having to walk out of their way to get to a destination may contribute to making the journey feel longer than it actually is.
