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United States24740 Posts
Have you ever had to park your car in a very difficult to reach spot? Are you really good at dealing with this? Really bad? I'm not that good, probably because I rarely have had to park in difficult places before. I have been fortunate to have dedicated parking on quiet streets, on driveways, etc. Until now.
My current parking space is in a garage with pillars all around, tight corners, etc. I expected my assigned spot to be difficult to utilize, and am happy that I don't have a big car. However, when I found the spot where my parking space is located, I was still surprised... it looks sort of like this:
The red rectangle represents my car in its spot. The blue rectangle is the car next to me, which happens to be some large ford vehicle and therefore sticks out of the spot a bit lengthwise, and is fairly wide as well. The pink is some standard passenger car, and the thin green rectangle is a motorcycle. The gray perimeter represents a concrete wall.
How do you get in and out of this spot? + Show Spoiler +If it's not immediately obvious to you, especially since my artwork is not exactly to scale, note that there is not much space between the blue car and the wall I am parking parallel to... therefore my car's left side needs to be within half a meter or so of the wall, greatly reducing the amount I can turn the wheel during one maneuver. Combine this with the fact that I can't back my car up very far because the isle between the rows of cars is narrow.
Today I decided to look at how other drivers deal with the same spot on another floor. There was a car exactly where mine would be, and he was backed in. The blue car was out today so I didn't have a chance to see how much easier it would make it backing in, but I plan to try it next chance I get. Does that sound like a good solution to those of you who have experience parking in tight spaces like this? It does make sense to me to have the wheels which can turn towards the aisle rather than towards the wall, but I've never really had to park back-in before so I've never given this much thought.
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I have very little driving (or parking) experience, but my first reaction was to back into the spot, and I was honestly surprised when I read the last paragraph. It seems for me the natural reaction would be to just stick the front of the car into the green squared bike and back in, but it's hard to say without knowing how big the aisle is. It does make a lot of sense to have the wheels that turn in that direction, it's always easier to rear into tight a parking space than the opposite.
At least now you will have experience parking in difficult spots. It's a good skill toi have.
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I'd say backing in is the best scenario, just use a close parking space like the one next to pink (no, not the motorcycle, the other spot next to pink) to pull in head first, then reverse and maneuver into your spot. I haven't found backing into a space that hard, just sit up straight and look at your side mirrors for where your rear tires are (I've found this method 100x easier than the typical turn around and look out the back window), and line that up with the line you're suppose to be within (and watch the front so you don't swing your frontend into pink).
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United States24740 Posts
On March 23 2014 12:13 SKC wrote:
I have very little driving (or parking) experience, but my first reaction was to back into the spot, and I was honestly surprised when I read the last paragraph. It seems for me the natural reaction would be to just stick the front of the car into the green squared bike and back in, but it's hard to say without knowing how big the aisle is. It does make a lot of sense to have the wheels that turn in that direction, it's always easier to rear into tight a parking space than the opposite.
At least now you will have experience parking in difficult spots. It's a good skill toi have.
Haha that I will. Regarding your suggestion to stick the front of the car into the bike, I don't think that will work because there is not enough distance between the cars on the left and the cars on the right. It isn't difficult for me to approach this 'wing' of the lot backwards though (car facing towards the bottom of the screen, but moving in reverse towards the top of the screen).
On March 23 2014 13:18 seiferoth10 wrote:
I'd say backing in is the best scenario, just use a close parking space like the one next to pink (no, not the motorcycle, the other spot next to pink) to pull in head first, then reverse and maneuver into your spot.
Seems good except I cannot normally use another space to front in to assist with my initial positioning... those spots also have cars... I just didn't put them because they didn't seem relevant.
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The space you use can be a little farther than the one next to pink, it's a closed end garage, not like there's a lot of traffic going through there. Past that, come home earlier to make sure people are still gone so you can use their space. Or get a motorcycle. OR get an obnoxiously large truck (F250 would be excellent) and lift it so it is obnoxiously large, then complain to your landlord that you can't use that spot.
Just read your post, enter that wing of the garage backwards if all else fails.
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yeah just force yourself to back in to the space. truck drivers (such as UPS truck drivers) are told to always back in to spaces when they can just because it's so much easier to leave a parking spot and avoid accidents.
i've been forcing myself to back into my parking spot at my apartment even though there's no reason. I'm not very good at it but I think it's a useful talent toi have so I'm practicing it
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Instead of backing in you could back all the way out of the parking garage from your spot and drive home in reverse.
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TLADT24920 Posts
I think backing in is the best option. It'll be easier to get out and I don't think it'll be that much more difficult to park it especially after you've done so a few times. I think eventually, you'll be able to tell at which point you can start changing your tires and go in reverse to park it, like a marker or so 
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Canada13389 Posts
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/lG6b3lq.png)
For backing into a spot, if you start turning when the rear bumper lines up as above then you will end up in the far left spot with minimal effort. Make sure there is a about a car width of space between your car and the spaces you are trying to get into. With just a little bit of practice in an empty lot it becomes very very easy to do. Of course based on the size of your car, you might need to adjust a little bit as if the back end is fairly large you might need to adjust, but for a sedan around the size of a civic/corolla if you follow that image, backing in is EZPZ.
However, for everyone here please note, for him to back in, he needs to turn his car around depending on how far the space is into the parking garage. He cant just drive past the spot then back in, he needs to somehow get going in reverse before approaching the spot to begin with.
So thats something you need to consider as well.
To get out assuming you parked front first -
back out straight as far as you can. Then you should have enough room to turn the wheel hard away from the wall then move forward as far as you can. You won't be out yet though. Turn the wheel hard in the opposite direction the whole way, back up a little more as much as you can then turn it the opposite way again and you should hopefully be able to squeeze out unless that blue square car is absolutely enormous. If you cant get out, you need to slowly inch your way bit by bit turning the wheel the whole way over and over. There's really no easy way to do it if you drive front first other than trying to inch in and out. you might still need to do this when you park back end first depending on the turning radius of the car, since you dont want to scrape the side of your car along the big ass blue square car either 
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I was just shocked how they parked in Rome or even in Paris. There is NO WAY get your car out before others move. Street parking was so extreme. 20-5cm between cars..
Bit offtopic also. They usually had window open and hand outside of the car(when driving). They were shouting and showing international hand signs :D It was pretty hilarious (Rome)
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I take it you're trying to avoid this?
Backing in is probably your easiest bet.
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I would be backing in, even if you have to turn around by pulling into an empty stall 4+ cars away. At my previous job, I had a half tonne truck with a canopy on the back, can't see anything in the rear view mirror, and was only allowed to park backing in (or pull through where permitted), so I just got very acquainted with my side mirrors.
I would recommend getting those little round blind spot mirrors for the bottom corner of your side mirrors as they allow you to see a nice angle on the close sides of your car and really help with proper spacing and making sure you don't hit anything.
On March 23 2014 17:27 y0su wrote:I take it you're trying to avoid this? Backing in is probably your easiest bet.
Wow, that was incredibly awful. Just... so bad...
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I'm absolutely terrible, if i'm trying to grab a park and i have to do reverse parking ill keep on driving and park 2 blocks away and walk.
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Angle your car so that you reverse to the spot to the right of the pink car and back in to it, then turn right to get out! Easy. Or ridiculous haha. I'm not sure if that would be so simple.
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I do love a parking challenge. The setup for your car park is identical to mine, however I have a space in the middle which is simple to park in.
In this instace, given the large Ford, I would try to reverse in to the car park and then just put on full lock to try and back into it.
You could use the space next to the pink car if it's vacant which would make it easier, however when the car park is full, reversing in with full lock is the best option.
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United States24740 Posts
I will be giving this a try today... and as I mentioned earlier I do have the ability to back into that region of the parking garage so that is not a big issue. I guess I will post in this thread how it went. Thanks Zeromus for that instruction... I will try it.
edit: driver of car next to me still out... oh well!
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United Kingdom36161 Posts
yes, of course you back in. I wouldn't even imagine going in forwards in the first place.
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On March 23 2014 18:54 igay wrote:
I'm absolutely terrible, if i'm trying to grab a park and i have to do reverse parking ill keep on driving and park 2 blocks away and walk.
Same. Fuck parking. Good luck micronesia!
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I thought this thread was about anal until I got to the diagram 
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You mean you didn't come to the conclusion that it was about parking a motorized vehicle after reading the first sentence?
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On March 24 2014 06:37 Grobyc wrote:
You mean you didn't come to the conclusion that it was about parking a motorized vehicle after reading the first sentence?
Everything is a euphemism. Everything.
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You back in, yes. Because if you go in forward, then you have to back out into the aisle, and then find somewhere to turn around or just go backwards through the entire lot.
How I would do it is this.
Find any open space on that row / aisle, whatever you want to call it. Park forwards into that spot as you normally would. Then back out of the spot, now driving in reverse towards the end of the aisle.
Maybe at this point you try to go more towards the pink car and not in the center of the aisle, nor do you want to be closer to the blue car. <- Vital. The proper time to start turning into your spot is just as ZeromuS said, though I would start out turning before your bumper reaches that line of the outside line of your spot (the other line being the end of the aisle). By first going backwards in a straight line near the pink car, you give yourself some wiggle room by turning before the bumper reaches the border of your spot.
This will ensure you don't hit the wall. After a while it will come naturally to you. The key here I think is to get there early and make sure someone else's spot is open so you don't have to drive backwards through the entire parking area!
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/rvTDxXi.png)
This was fun.
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United States24740 Posts
Hah, nice diagram. One thing I've noticed is I need to leave a fair amount of room between my car and the cars on the left, otherwise when I cut the wheel to the left the right side of the front bumper will scrape the parked cars on the left. I guess the best line would be roughly half-way between the center of the aisle and the left side of the aisle.
As I mentioned earlier, getting the car turned around is not a problem, actually. I will just practice and play with those 'gaps' you drew until as you also said, it comes naturally. I'm still waiting for a chance to try it with the other cars all parked there.
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Ha! Did I make you scrape someone's bumper?
I like doing it with a 'gap' between the lines like in the diagram because it allows me to almost hit the Big Blue Truck's bumper, at which point I correct the path barely, narrowly missing the corner of the bumper, and then crank it!
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United States24740 Posts
I'm definitely getting better at the 'back-in' maneuver... but nobody has been parked next to me lately so this is currently not even an issue!
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EPT![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/NKsGFdc.png)
