Colonial Parking

Worst garage that I have ever been to in DC or otherwise? This one. One would think that being near the courts, museums and Mall that this place would be a well oiled machine to maximize profits? Nope. It’s like a rusty relic of the days past where people had time to wait around for things… It never works well for me to have a garage like that.
You drive into the garage and get a ticket handed to you by a person. ?? Then you pay. Then you go park your own car even though you see a board with all these keys and all the signs say only leave your car key in the car… So then you go find a spot but they are all reserved and you drive and drive and drive. Then you park and try to exit and need to take the stairs or elevator but they are not visible… So you have to follow the signs but then when you get to the elevator it is a new system that asks you where you are going… But you aren’t sure if you’ve never been there before… Then you make it to the lobby of a building and the doors don’t let you out save for one…
Then you come back for your car but you have to walk in through the way you drove because the building is closed. Then you walk behind where the employee who gives you tickets is sitting and walk down a ramp and open one door and then another to the elevators that you can’t see unless you know are there… And the door after door feeling makes it seem like Alice in Wonderland…
Then you finally make it to your car and have to exit the way you came in a narrow space without mirrors so you had better hope no one else is coming… If there is… Pray they drive slowly.

To be fair, this parking lot is currently under construction so there is a chance it will get better.
Pros:
$ 10 event parking (vs $ 20+ a little closer) 3 blocks from the Verizon center.
Accepts credit cards
Pay up front
Cons:
Under construction so debris/​dust everywhere
No entrance on foot for non residents
No mention of this when paying for parking
Taking the stairs down to your level = being locked in the stairwell and having to go all the way back up (not cool 4 levels under ground!)
The only way back in to your car is down the ramp people are also driving down
Closes at midnight
Hopefully anyone reading this will be spared the confusion since the attendants didn’t bother to tell us any of this.

Worst Parking garage EVER!
Let me just say that I drive a pickup truck. Not a very big one, but it’s not a compact car. So I understand that parking garages are a bit of a challenge for us 4-​wheel drive drivers, and that its usually tight. But this place has the worst floor plan I have ever seen in a parking garage. They have spots where people can park 2 deep as along you leave a key in the ignition for someone ELSE to move your car so the car in the back can get out.
ARE YOU KIDDING ME!!! Why would anyone in the right mind do this?! Why would a parking garage allow some random person drive your car? Who’s to say they will not steal it?! At least with Valet attendants they are on a business’ payroll and can be identified if your car is stolen.
In addition to this ridiculous parking scheme, exits and entrances to the garage are not clearly marked. And when they are, all the doors on the main floor were locked. So that meant that you had to go all they way down to where the cars came in and walk against the incoming traffic to the garage (because this is SO safe…) to get to 6^th street.
Free parking or not, if I have to come to this area again I am going to metro it. The Archives Metro is not too far.