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<br />Fashion Valley employs a traffic specialist company during this time of year to <br />direct flow and help shoppers avoid flame-outs. As many as 15 people are stationed <br />at various mall spots. Valet parking also is available. <br /> <br />Shoppers themselves can be something of parking specialists, too. <br /> <br />Check out the parking lot under the trolley line that runs near Fashion Valley. <br />Oops, that's no parking lot. That's space shoppers have made into a parking lot. It's <br />not Fashion Valley property, so the mall doesn't police that, Doherty said. <br /> <br />San Diego police, who run a special holiday detail at the mall to prevent car thefts <br />and the like, don't ticket. "It's Christmas, so we don't want to mess with that," said <br />Sgt. Danny Orduno. <br /> <br />The extra space comes in handy. "We've lived here for 20 years and it keeps getting <br />worse," said La Jolla's Eileen Carroll, shopping with Bob Prager last Sunday. They <br />looked for a space for 10 minutes and were about to give up, before rmding a spot <br />under the trolley line. <br /> <br />Chris Campion, shopping with Jon McKee, said this: "We're idiots for coming out <br />on Sunday." <br /> <br />Shoppers are nothing if not focused as they drive through the lots and parking <br />garages, these days. Few seem to be idly chatting on cell phones when going about <br />this quest. You see them in their cars and SUVs, heads swiveling, eyes darting. <br /> <br />Take a few steps in the parking lot and a driver cruising past inevitably <br />asks: "You leaving?" <br /> <br />Oddly, some malls didn't even want to comment. They wouldn't even say why they <br />wouldn't comment. <br /> <br />That's the story from Westfield Shoppingtown, which runs many shopping malls in <br />San Diego County, including Horton Plaza downtown, University Towne Centre <br />and North County Fair in Escondido. <br /> <br />The Westfield Web site, however, does list the number of parking spaces at most of <br />the major shopping centers in the San Diego area. So it is, apparently, a selling <br />point. <br /> <br />Plaza Bonita has 4,350 parking spaces. Carlsbad's Plaza Camino Real has 6,234. <br />And Mission Valley Center has 6,336, the Web site says. <br /> <br />Believe it or not, malls are not designed to frustrate the holiday shopper. There's a <br />significant amount of thought that goes in to creating the proper number of parking <br />spaces to accommodate the rush. <br /> <br />2 <br />