
Home Is Where the Parking Lot Is [video] - wdr1
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/06/opinion/long-term-parking.html
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nxzero
It's not uncommon for airline employees to have non-standard living
arrangements, though seems more common to use apartments with 4+ people to a
room with beds filled based on first come, first serve; basically time-share
like low cost version of AirBnb.

Using trailers and employee parking lots sounds expensive for the employees
and airlines too. Beyond that, guessing it's noisy and that theirs not much of
use close to the parking lot.

~~~
smoyer
My sister-in-law was a flight attendant for United Express for a while and
shared a two bedroom apartment with seven other women. It worked great 95% of
the time since most nights over half of them were away.

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et-al
Thanks for sharing this video. I was worried it'd be about another employee
who's taking advantage of their company perks ( _lifehacking.._ ), instead
it's an insightful video of people who are living in unconventional
arrangements probably due to things outside their control.

While everyone interviewed seems to speak of freedom, I feel like their body
language and state of their living quarters say otherwise. You have one person
who breaks down when he mentions he's been there for 11 years. Why? The
workers seem like they're making the best of their situation, dealing with it,
but not necessarily reveling in it the way #vanlife Instagrammers would have
us believe.

~~~
miketery
Even before the one guy broke down. You could tell the way he was repeating
him self - "I'm happy here" "I'm happy here" it was very unhealthy and then he
couldn't hold it anymore. Seems to be a lonely lifestyle.

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digi_owl
I find myself reminded of a theater comedy where a guy is dating multiple
flight attendants. The comedy comes from none of the ladies knowing about each
other, and his carefully laid out schedule being disrupted by canceled
flights.

~~~
dmckeon
Perhaps "Boeing, Boeing" \- done as a film in 1965
[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0058981/](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0058981/)
and in multiple stage and film versions.

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Lio
Makes me think of Hero Protagonist from Snow Crash living in a storage lockup
on the edge of LAX.

~~~
retbull
Isn't it Hiro?

~~~
Lio
Doh! Yes of course you're right, it is Hiro Protagonist.

I just typed comment without thinking! :)

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atourgates
I wonder about the practicality of essentially "boondocking", on a permanent
basis. You'd need to run a generator for electricity (solar power would work,
but I didn't see any panels), and you'd need to go somewhere occasionally to
fill up your water tanks, and dump your sewage.

But I suppose, if you're only home a couple nights a week, you're not using
tons of electricity, water or sewage capacity in any case.

I wonder how laundry works? Maybe they take care of that at hotels when
they're overnighting on the road?

EDIT: From reading responses here[1], it looks like the average is about
4-weeks for a single person, obviously reduced by half for every person you
add.

If you're just a single person, only there 20% of the time, it seems like you
might really only be dumping and filling your tanks every 4-5 months.

[1] [http://www.irv2.com/forums/f93/how-long-can-a-class-a-
boondo...](http://www.irv2.com/forums/f93/how-long-can-a-class-a-
boondock-144264.html)

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mstrem
With my dad being an airline pilot and having grown up in the "pilot
community" I must say that this style of living is probably by far the
exception rather than the norm.

My family, and all my parent's friends (most of which were pilots or air
attendants), all had what you could call normal a house with normal lives etc.
etc.

By most means life was pretty much the same as anyone else.

~~~
Symbiote
That was after he had a child — do you know his living arrangements before you
were born, or perhaps before he was married?

How often did your dad sleep away from home? That could vary a lot, some
schedules must plan to return home every day, but for longer routes that's
simply not possible.

[1] says "Short haul pilots for low cost airlines typically start and finish
their day at their allocated base", "between 2 and 6 flights a day", but "Long
haul pilots fly all over the world and can spend a lot of time away from home.
Trips can last from a few days to over a week"

[1] [http://www.flightdeckfriend.com/airline-pilot-job-
realities](http://www.flightdeckfriend.com/airline-pilot-job-realities)

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galfarragem
Being able to walk to your job will provide you more happiness than a lawn and
a very long commute.

Time and peace of mind are often underrated.

~~~
Normal_gaussian
A lawn I can lie and eat out on during the evenings and weekends? The ability
to have real cats that roam and dogs that amble around freely?

No. You can't be so certain what will provide any given person with real
happiness.

~~~
larubbio
Why not have both? Cities have parks that you can lie and eat out on during
the evenings and weekends. They also have dog parks. Free roaming cats are bad
for birds, so keep them inside. [https://abcbirds.org/program/cats-
indoors/cats-and-birds/](https://abcbirds.org/program/cats-indoors/cats-and-
birds/)

~~~
athenot
The free-roaming birds in my yard (red tail hawks) are bad for rabbits and
small dogs... :)

For me, the real reason for a yard is for my children to run around in it, to
explore and play on their own without the need for planned activities or
helicopter parenting.

It _used_ to be permissible to let kids play in public parcs on their own but
nowadays, that's a great way of becoming the person who writes "Home is where
the bars are".

