Pull through parkers - please be careful and pull through slowly.
I have on more than one occasion had someone pull through while I, on the other side having pulled in parked, was just opening my door, not at all expecting someone to speedily pull through from that direction. I was more carefully looking to be sure someone wasn’t coming in from “the usual direction.”
“Pulling through” when there are cars on either side of the space and you do not have a very wide field of vision as to who may be coming in the other way is an unsafe practice. Don’t do this unless you are willing to park further out in the lot where you are surrounded by empty spaces.
How do I get to this alternate universe? I think I might enjoy living there. 
Yes. I’m almost perfect at getting it right the first time. The problem is drivers who don’t understand that parallel parking is an actual thing. Multiple times I’ve pulled alongside the parked car (ahead of the space), dutifully signalling my intent. But as I prepare to reverse into the open slot, Bubba is 18 inches behind me in his pickup - utterly confused as to why someone wants to back up in the street.
That’s a problem with back-in parking too. The would be back-in parker drives past the open spot and then put the car in reverse. At least in the two parking locations I frequent the most, our office garage and the shopping center where our favorite grocery store is, there is likely a car following you closely enough that they will be blocking you at least psychologically, if not physically. And will honk furiously when your reverse lights come on.
That’s why at work we ban back-in parking on the first two levels because the delays back up traffic out of the garage and into the street, which the City is not happy about. The ban doesn’t stop everyone.
I always back into parking spaces unless conditions such as traffic simply won’t allow it or grocery/costco shopping requires more than just a casual access to opening of the Acadia’s back hatch. I even back into my front driveway-attached garage because of the way our street curves and with vehicles or our next door neighbour parking his da*m 5th wheel trailer on the street causing visibility issues.
Something I watched someone do today, which I thought about asking folks in this thread about:
I went to a local grocery store this afternoon. Their parking lot is laid out with diagonal parking spots, though as you drive up a lane in the lot, only the parking spots on your right side are oriented “correctly” for you to easily pull into – the spots on your left side are oriented to be “correct” for people driving in the other direction.
This makes it a little different from the layout in most parking lots with diagonal parking, where you can easily pull forward into spots on either side of you. And, yes, the driving lanes in the lot are wide enough to allow two cars to pass each other, and effectively work like two-way streets, as far as how people drive through them.
As I was getting out of my car, I watched a guy back into a diagonal space: what I think he had done (I didn’t see him start his maneuver) was drive past it, then cross over to park in the “left” side spots (relative to how he had been driving up the lane), so that he could wind up parked nose-out.
I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone do something like that before.
This thread has turned me into a consistent back in parker. I used to be sporadic, now I do it whenever I remember to. It’s a complete win win win for me. My trunk is now 12 feet closer to my front door whenever i have groceries to unload, and I no longer have to play “Sure hope no one’s coming” when I pull out. I can pull in about five seconds slower backing in, and if you’ve got a problem waiting those five seconds (most times there’s no one waiting) then my ass is available for biting.
Clever. Kind of like an informal SPUI overpass interchange. Can’t say I can recall seeing it nearly ever.
Might be super efficient coming and going … once everyone else is no longer surprised by folks doing that wrong side in / wrong side out maneuver.
The funny thing is that the lot at that store used to be laid out like a “normal” diagonal-parking lot. They repaved it and restriped everything a year or two ago, and made this change.
When they did this, they made the driving lanes wider, too, to accommodate two-way traffic. I’m fairly sure that led to a net decrease in the number of spaces in the lot, but it’s not a terribly busy store anymore (it used to be busier, decades ago, when I first moved to the area), and it doesn’t share its lot with any other stores or businesses. Most times when I shop there, the lot is less than 1/4 full anyway.
The city is threatening to shut down the entrance to our office garage because in the last month we have had two cases where employees backing into parking spaces have caused a line of cars (I’m guessing more than 10) to back up on the busy road and into the busy intersection that is 150 feet from the garage entrance.
There are signs that say “Head in Parking Only” but some people just know better than the Facilities Managers and the Police. Or maybe they don’t know what head-in parking means.
So now they have delays from people backing out, instead. How is this an improvement?
In the first case (with slow back-in parkers), the backup extends out onto the street as everyone is trying to get into the parking garage. This affects the public as a whole (and emergency traffic).
In the latter case (with head-in parkers who back up to leave at the end of the day), the backup occurs in the parking garage itself, which only affects the people in the parking garage, and not the city street.
There would also be an improvement if people tend to all get there at the same time when they arrive in the morning, and depart at different times (if that is indeed the case). But the other consideration discussed above is likely what the city cares about.
If you want to park back in you can on levels 3 to 6. You’re not supposed to on levels 1 and 2 because it impacts the traffic on the public road.
But the back in parkers are better than the rest of us. They are so sure they are right, they will back into the space marked “head in parking only”. Obviously the people who put that sign up are idiots, everyone knows backing in is The Right Way.
It wouldn’t be quite as bad if the back in folks had small cars or parking assist and could back in quickly. But they are usually the biggest SUVs or trucks. And it takes them forever to back in. Not to mention they will sit there with their reverse lights on until the car behind them goes back allowing them space to access the space they’ve driven past. “Why are you tailgating me in the garage?” Because there are people trying to get off the damn street.
I usually park nose first, partly because my car is old enough not to have a rear view camera. But a few months ago I had a big Toyota pickup truck on a business trip. It had a raised hood that made driving forward a little bit blind. I found that using the rear view camera made parking between the lines easier.
My car is wide bodied and I can’t always tell if I nailed the center of the parking spot so I’ll flip it in reverse to see on camera if I’m between the lines. I still crane my neck around when reversing though out of habit, feels wrong to look at the screen while moving. Love the side mirror alarms though, saved many a pedestrian lingering in my blind spot
The last thing I want to do is stick up for people who drive needlessly big vehicles but the biggest trucks and SUVs are the one who don’t have a choice but to back in. As a rough approximation, the amount of aisle space necessary to back in is equal to the turning radius of the car. The amount of space necessary to back in is equal to the turning radius of the car plus the length of the car. My hunch is the aisles in that parking garage are not nearly wide enough to let those trucks pull straight in. Maybe the people parking in the garage do know better than facilities management and the police because they know what their vehicle is capable of. And maybe the solution is to ban all vehicles but small ones from the first level or two of the garage. But this will only work if you are prepared to enforce it.
Yup, these people are both disproportionately higher ranking and disproportionately cranky people. We always have issues with them parking in “compact car only” spaces which are at the corners between levels which makes going around those corners dangerous.
And yes, the people with big trucks and SUVs are demanding that we widen the spaces and kick 50 people out of the garage. We do not have enough spaces in the garage for everyone as it is.
Criminy. That makes no sense. I meant to say that the amount of aisle space necessary to back in is equal to the turning radius of the car. The amount of space necessary to drive straight in is equal to the turning radius of the car plus the length of the car.
Are you assuming that the parking spaces are laid out perpendicular to the traffic lane (i.e., at a 90-degree angle to the traffic lane)?
IME (and I’d be curious if @Mighty_Mouse can clarify for the ramp at their office) a lot of parking ramps use angled/herringbone parking spaces, at a 45-ish degree angle from the traffic lane, in the direction of traffic, like the left side of the picture below. If that’s how that garage is laid out, backing any car into those spaces will take more space, as you need to change the angle of your car by ~225 degrees in order to park backed-in.
The parking spaces are at 90 degrees to the travel lanes. There is plenty of room for even large cars to pass each other traveling in opposite directions even if large cars are parked on both sides. There is a lot more space between the parked cars than the picture you posted.
There are almost 600 spaces on six levels. The parking spaces are on each side of twelve ramps (or rather 10 ramps and 2 flat levels, the entrance level and the very top level).
If you are parked on the first level and are trying to back out of your parking space at 5:05pm you may have a car blocking you. But if you pull out even a few inches, the next car will see you and let you out. Because we all work in the same place and most of us are not assholes. And the ones who are assholes are mostly afraid that the person they are blocking in may be their boss’ boss or even worse, the CEO’s Executive Assistant.
The problems come from a tiny minority who think that the rules don’t apply to them. Most people drive very slow, park between the lines, don’t park in the EV, Disabled and Compact Car spots mid the aren’t supposed to, are careful coming around corners, etc. If for no other reason than there are cameras everywhere.