The Impound Garage (also known as the Impound Lot) is an underground parking garage near police stations in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas that stash cars that have been towed (creating an excuse for the disappearing vehicle glitch). Entering the impound without a law enforcement vehicle will result in police officers pointing pistols at the player and if the player doesn't kill him, he always calls for backup and they will get a three-star wanted level, no matter whether the player leaves the area or not.
Purpose
The Impound Garage lets the player get back his vehicle if he lost it during a cutscene before a mission. Impound Garages are underground parking garages. The first few floors of the garages have Police cars that spawn in the parking spaces; The very bottom floor or the very back of the Impound Garage stashes cars that have been lost by the player. The impound garage is like a save garage. However, the mechanics behind the Impound Garage are rather random, and usually aren't very predictable.
Some missions have "Clear Area" commands, which remove any parked vehicle within a certain radius from the mission's marker. These vehicles are then placed inside an impound garage, and the player can then enter one of these garages and recover his lost vehicle.
However, random vehicles that the player never drove or even abandoned may still spawn in the garage. Also, due to a glitch, vehicles may sometimes spawn stuck inside of each other, or they may spawn stuck halfway inside the ground. Also, strange occurences may happen in impound garages if the player is playing certain side missions like Vigilante or Export missions; Vehicles will spawn stacked on top of each other or laying on their sides. Aircraft, like Dodos or even Hydras may spawn unlocked. Impound Garages exhibit strange behaviors like these very commonly.
Since the Impound Garage is never mentioned in any instructional guides for the game (not even in the booklet that comes with the game), it can be assumed that this game feature could have been a work in progress during development, but was never perfected or implemented properly.
When player visits the Los Santos police garage and San Fierro police garage two police officers will leave the Police Car and player will also see another two police officers beating a random citizen, if player goes deeper, another two officers can be seen, one is working to the police car (with open hood) and another one at the entrance of police department.
Locations
- Commerce, Los Santos - Just north of Pershing Square and west the Los Santos Police Headquarters.
- Downtown, San Fierro - At the back of the San Fierro Police Headquarters.
- Roca Escalante, Las Venturas - Around back of the Las Venturas Police Headquarters.
Trivia
- The front gate and garage door of the impound garage will open up for the player if he is in a police vehicle, and the player may enter the garage this way without having any police point their pistols at him. However, the police will start shooting at CJ if he exits the police vehicle, or if at least 5 minutes have passed.
- In the beta version, there is a mission which was supposed to introduce impound garages to the player, however, it was cut, suggesting that Rockstar just left the impound garage feature for the player to find.
- In Grand Theft Auto V if the player customizes a car at LS Customs and then abandons it the car will spawn at an impound, the player can then retrieve it for a fee.