If you're reading this post I'm assuming you own a car or you are thinking of buying a car, right? so in either cases you are going to use your car extensively to around the city, travel and etc. No matter if you have a parking garage or not, you might need to park your car on the street in some occasions. So, before parking you car on the street remember this post and it's tips.
Have you ever looked for a parking spot in a busy and crowded city like New York, Washington D.C, San Francisco or Philadelphia? We all know in such cities a tiny room to park the car is such precious but have you ever came across one of those cars that are parked right in the middle of giant parking space wasting a lot of real-states enough for another car to park? at the moment, we might literarily curse the owner of that car for that waste and irresponsible parking. But the important question coming to mind is Do We Park Our Cars Responsibly?
I came across many of these irresponsibly parked cars. Here is an examples:
Since I faced several of these irresponsibly parked cars while I was hunting for parking space, I though it would be useful to share tips that I think are useful to optimize our parking experience. Hope if we all use these tips we can make a better parking habit and enjoy driving even more.
The following video describe my 3 step tips visually. I have detailed description of the tips in the rest of the post.
1- Do NOT Park in the Middle
Yes! Do not park in middle, do not waste space, period. I know it is exciting to find a pretty large parking spot but it is not cool to park your tiny small hatchback right in the middle of the parking spot that can contain to large SUVs and literarily make is useless for anyone else. Unfortunately, I have observed such behavior with my eyes. A man parked his small car in the middle of wide parking space and proudly got out of the car and walked away! Come on dude! there is no pride for being such a cheap driver!
So, not that I've emphasized enough on the importance of NOT parking in the center, here is the actual tip. After you got close enough to the curb and paralleled your car with it (some drivers do not even care about the latter!), drive your car either close to the car in front of you or behind you. Go close enough that you can get out (1 ~ 1.5 ft is enough). By doing this, you are not dividing the parking space into two tiny useless spaces but you make it a larger one piece of free space which can be used by other cars. Even if the space is not wide enough to contain any other vehicles, it will help to make more space available after the other cars around you leave and new cars are parked.
2- Choose Sides Wisely
In the previous tip I said get close to either the car in front of you or behind you but which one to choose? well, that depends on the arrangement of the vehicles in the street. Before you choose, look around to analyze the situation (it won't take more than 5 seconds, I promise). Choose the side that has parked better. What do I mean? okay, let's assume the car behind you has parked close to the car behind it (so parked responsibly). But the car in front of you has parked with quite a distance from the next vehicle (parked irresponsibly) This means more space is being wasted in front of it. In such situation it is better to park closer to the car behind you because eventually when the car in front of you leaves, more space will be available (see the video for visualization)
3- Be a Good Beginner and Finisher
Most of the streets have a No Stopping zone close to junctions. Surprisingly enough, I have observed several vehicles that are parked significantly far from these parking signs wasting half a vehicle space useless. Just today, I observed a Honda Fit, parked at least 4 feet away from the sign in front of it.
So remember, when you are the first or last car in the parking zone, align front or back of your car with the parking sign, so no space get wasted. As long as you do not enter the No Stopping zone, you are 100% fine.
Update: today I saw the same Honda Fit again, parked another side of the street. Seems its driver has the habit of wasting space although this time it was just one ft away from the sign.
Same honda Fit parked with distance from the sign!
Hope these tips help all of us park better on the streets and make more space available for our fellow drivers. Please share your thought in the comments below or using #parkresponsibly