Lots and lots of parking lots=lots of pollution

Yeah, those mega-sized parking lots may as bad as you imagine they are. Convenient for drivers, magnets for shoppers going to the big-box stores and malls. But ugly, indeed, for our little planet. That's the conclusion of Purdue researcher Bryan Pijanowski, shown in the picture above standing in one of his favorite research locations.

Working in a medim-sized Midwestern county his research team found three parking spaces for each resident driver. So next time you can't find a parking place in San Francisco or Washington D.C. just head on out to Indiana. This unnamed county has eleven parking places for every local household. The effects of all this pavement, absorbing sun, shedding rain and car detritus? Hotter urban areas and more water pollution, says Pijanowski. Yummy to think of all that dripping engine oil slushed down the storm drains in a midwestern thunder shower, if they're strill getting rain in that region.