Garage (residential)
Most garages also serve multifunction duty as workshops for a variety of projects, including painting, woodworking, and assembly.
[1] By 1908 the architect Charles Harrison Townsend was commenting in The Builder magazine that "for the home of the car, we very largely use the French word 'garage', alternatively with what I think the more desirable English equivalent of 'motor house'".
In northern climates, temperatures inside an uninsulated attached residential garage can decrease to freezing levels during the winter.
Temperatures inside an uninsulated attached garage in temperate climates can reach uncomfortable levels during summer months.
Newer homes feature more American styled tilting panel lift doors which slide up onto a track on the ceiling via a motor and chain drive.
Australia has strict guidelines in place when building a home and the garage size must conform to the Australian Standards.
A typical large family car like the Ford Mondeo is about 15 by 6 feet (4.6 m × 1.8 m), meaning that even with the larger size garage, it is necessary to park to one side to be able to open the driver's door wide enough to enter or exit the vehicle.
In the early days of the motor car, a garage played an important role in protecting the vehicle from the weather (particularly so as to reduce rust).
It was also the case that early motor cars started more easily when they were warm,[5] so that keeping them in a garage rather than outside made it easier to get the engine going in the morning.
Charles Harrison Townsend was one of the few architects who put pen to paper (in The Builder in 1908) on the subject and recommended that the walls be glazed brick for ease of washing, air gratings to be low (petrol fumes are heavier than air), and drains half open to avoid build-up of gases.
[9] Many garage doors open upward using an electric chain drive, which can often be automatically controlled from inside the resident's vehicle with a small radio transmitter.
Earlier garages were often detached and located in the back yard of the house, accessed either via a long driveway or from an alley.
As automobiles became more popular, the concept of attaching the garage directly to the home grew into a common practice.
Around the start of the 21st century, companies began offering "portable garages" in the United States.
[19] One of the oldest surviving private garages in Germany today is the 1903 finished Automobil-Remise (automobile carriage house) of Villa Esche by Henry van de Velde in Chemnitz.
Garages in the United States and Canada used to store streetcars and buses are often referred to as carhouses or car barns.
These storage facilities are either metal or brick structures used to store streetcars or buses away from the elements.
