Yeah, that would’ve been my answer as well. I’ve always excelled at parallel parking, even the first time I learned it in driver’s ed. I just know where the ends of the car are. Not coincidentally, I’m also excellent at steering a 45’ rowing shell with my foot while facing backwards. And I score much higher than most females on spatial puzzles.
So, yeah, I think some of it’s inate. But, I bet practice would make a world o’difference. I"d second what the others are saying and go practice in an empty lot. If you have a second car to practice with, that’d be ideal. Otherwise, make sure you put a flag or something on the cones so they stick up high enough that you can see them from your car windows.
Move to some place without off street parking. You’ll get good fast!
Or maybe your arms are too short
I failed pp on my drivers test, not because I didn’t get the car into the space without touching the cones, but because the examiner didn’t think I turned around far enough to look behind me. I’m pretty short, so I would have had to stand up to turn any farther. Oh well, I passed the overall test, so its ok.
I have to respectfully disagree. I have absolutely dismal spatial awareness. That’s why I have to use very specific markers like “when the mirror is in line with the blah blah blah”. When I moved to where I live (no parking lots, all street parking) I nearly cried. I thought I’d never learn. Took me about a week of bumping bumpers (Sorry!) to work it out.
My mother has literally no depth perception as measured by that little machine in the doctor’s office. She’s BSed the DMV for years to get her license (and never had an accident, so she must be doing something right.) Those little 3D glasses? Don’t work for her. She can’t catch a ball, even thrown softly, because she can’t tell where it is or how close to her it is. She can’t throw a ball at a target, because she can’t tell how far away it is. Spatial awareness tests? Fails 'em every time.
The first six months I lived here, she made me come down and park the car for her whenever she visited. Finally, after I was proficient and had figured out the visual cues, I simply taught her. Took less than an afternoon. She can park like a pro now.
Sorry, I’ll let people argue genetics and physical limitations for lots of things, but not parallel parking!
I’m tall-ish (6’3"), and I’ve always felt that this gives me a driving advantage. My sight-lines out of the car go much farther down than the sight-lines of shorter folks. (There’s a large lever arm for this effect, since many vision obstructions are near one’s head.) I have on occasion slouched down (while parked) to see what the world looks like to, say, my 5’3" mother, and I couldn’t even see the hood anymore! That would make parallel parking much more difficult!
For what it’s worth, I can squeeze my car into a mailbox if needed. (I’ve had lots of practice, though, so my height theory could be bunk.)
I’m 6’5" so I think the height theory doesn’t work.
I tend to agree with the spatial awareness theory. I have a hard time judging distances most of the time. If I’m playing golf and there aren’t any yard markers on the course, I’m doomed.
Last night I was at a friend’s house. They lived on top of a hill so I had to go up their driveway and then somehow back my car around, avoiding a large tree, and the point it back down the narrow driveway.
No matter how much I tried, as I backed up, it seemed that the tree was always in my way. I could not avoid the tree. The more I steered away from it, the closer it got.
I seem to get confused from looking forward and then looking backward. I lose sight of which direction my car is pointing.
Your 12" do-not-violate “force field” WILL keep you from learning to parallel park properly.
While it’s possible for a skilled, experienced parallel parker to meet this criterion (i’ve had panicky passengers who squeal if I “get too close”), it’s very difficult to learn to parallel park that way. If there is one single “figure of merit” to parking easily in the widest variety of demanding situations, it’s this: minimize the distance between you front passenger corner bumper, and the rear driver side bumper We’re talking 1-2 inches (or less), not 1-2 feet!
I considered myself a fairly adequate parallel parker as a college student. I lived in Cambridge and Allston/Brighton at the time–no off street parking, and barely room to drive down some streets between the dual rows of 1970s land-yachts [After the Oil embargos of the 1970s, no one wanted those over-sized “living rooms on wheels” so they were a glut on the market for poor college students. Cars that no city-dweller would sensibly buy for on-street parking became the rule] Oh, and did I mention Boston’s response to the “parking crisis”? They shortened the parking spaces to create more spaces – that no one could fit into! [By 1981, it was no longer physically possible to park most 70s era cars legally in some parts of Boston. I was driving a 22.5" Caddy Fleetwood and an 18.5" LTD when they re-painted all Boston parking spots and replanted the meters at 16" intervals.]
Then I discovered that tip, and I wondered where it had been all my life. I’ve taught many people to drive since then, and the only one who has the slightest difficulty parallel parking is my sister, who stubbornly refuses to listen to parking advice from her big brother or anyone else (and who, incidentally, has only gotten worse at parking over the years. Though she, too, lived in the city for many years, she now makes someone else drive if she’s going someplace without a parking garage)
Rephrased for clarity. Although I think the 1-2" estimate is pretty extreme … clearing the front car’s rear bumper by 6-12 inches should be adequate.
Still, this is an example of a situation where you shouldn’t be afraid to tap another car. If you tap (ever so gently, now), just pull back out and readjust your entry into the space.
In drivers’ ed, I was taught to back up until the front of my car until it was in line with the back of the other person’s car (or something like that). So, I’d back the car up and get yelled at for going too far or not going far enough or whatever (it was the football coach - yelling = motivation or something). So I’d back up a little more or go forward a little more until the yelling stopped and then tried to get the car somewhere into place.
It wasn’t for several years after that that I found out that other people could see the hood of the car when they’re driving or parking. And they weren’t wildly randomly guessing where the front of the car might be, so for them, lining it up involved looking rather than trying to remember how big the car was compared to where you were sitting inside it. (Sitting down, I’m really short. No one noticed that. Not even me.)
I’ve since found that I can almost always avoid parallel parking - even living in a city where I have to park on the street quite frequently.
((Strangely, on tests, I have very good spatial awareness. I have huge parallel parking problems))
A good part of the backing into spaces and parallel parking thing is knowing the inputs to use to make your car pivot the way you want, and being comfortable in the knowledge that if you can get your ass in, the rest will follow. Or more precisely, can follow.
I avoid bumping cars as best I can but sometimes things are just so tight that it’s impossible. And if someone parks an inch from my bumper, sorry pal. If you don’t want you widdle bumper to get widdle bumps and scratches then don’t crowd me or better yet put it in a parking lot.
Your back bumpers should be even, but I always learned this rule phrased differently: When your mirror (a good pointer) passes their mirror, stop your car and turn the wheel all the way to the right. Let go of the brakes and let the car’s idle carry you slowly backward.
Again, exactly right – but because turning the wheel is “slow” for some people, I teach friends to spin the wheel hard right before they roll at all.
I always thought of this as the hard part: figuring out when to whip the wheel all the way left. WhyNot gives a pretty good reference here. You’re tall, so you can see their rear bumper pretty well. Turn on your headlights for confidence – you should be able to see the reflection of your right bulb in the paint or chrome on the back of their car. Because paint and oddly-shaped chrome reflect light strangely, you can use this reflection to gauge how close you are to their car: the more like a headlight with a bulb the patch of light looks (and the smaller it is) the closer you are.
Move slowly until you’re sure you’ve cleared their bumper, and begin to concentrate on your rear-view mirror now. Just make sure you don’t hit that car in the back too hard. It’s okay to tap them, just a little teeny bit, especially if their car is more expensive than yours.
Once you’re in the spot, straighten out, back a little closer to the car behind you to give yourself room to escape, and take a deep breath.
I’m with Futile on this one. You are probably a bit lacking in spacial awareness (like me). Are you any good at chess? How about orientating yourself from map to real world?
It’s not so much reading maps, as the initial orientation. For instance, I live in NYC, and have been for 15 years yet, when I get off the subway, I invariably guess incorrectly which way is which.
How long have you been driving this particular car? It could be a result of inadequate familiarity with the vehicle, as variables such as turning radius, wheelbase, extension foward and aft of the axles, overall width and length, etc. have a lot to do with being able to maneouver consistently.
I drive a monster of a vehicle - an extended length E350 van, with an additional monstrous appendage of a fabricated steel deck where the rear bumper used to be. When I first got it, I was a bit intimidated when reversing or maneouvering through tight spaces, but now, I can reverse in an alley into a spot between two other vehicles with an inch on either side (exiting via the rear doors). Just a matter of time to get used to it.
