Mayfair Mall Unveils App Directly Holiday Customers to Open Parking Spaces

Tomorrow is December 1 and we don't have to tell you it's the busy season at shopping malls.

But this year Mayfair Mall in Wauwatosa is showing off a new app that tries to make sure customers spend more time searching for a gift than a parking spot.

The app is called "GGP Malls" - named for the company that owns Mayfair Mall and others. What customers need to do is select the Mayfair Mall location to be shown a diagram of the parking lots.  

"So they're going to see the parking fields that will be color-coded based on their current status - how many parking spaces are available. So it's really easy to use," Chris Jaeger, senior general manager, said.

The app uses a stoplight-color system to show how busy individual lots are. Parking lots shown in green are not busy while parking lots shown in red are nearly capacity.

The new app will also let customers select what store they are headed to, then direct them to the least busy parking lot, Jaeger said.

"To figure out how busy it is we use heat maps but it's something that throughout the day we're constantly evaluating the lot levels. So it's something that we do in person as well," Jaeger said.

And just a quick reminder: please, don't try to use that app if you're driving around the parking lot. Leave that duty up to a passenger (or take a look before you leave your home).