How to Parallel Park
Parallel parking is one of those topics that sends fear through the hearts and souls of most drivers young and old, but this need not be the case. With practice, parallel parking can be as easy as any other maneuver. I think that people dread this maneuver so much because it is usually done in traffic in a busy downtown setting, with other people in the car. Also, unless they work downtown, not to many people practice parallel parking on a daily basis. If you practice this move and you can keep your wits about you and stay calm, parallel parking can be just like any other maneuver, easy, safe and simple.
Like so many aspects of driving, parallel parking comes down to judgement. The streets are crowded and you are driving around looking for the best spot that looks big enough to fit your car, is close enough to wherever you would like to go and isn’t a no parking zone for one reason or another. So, the whole event starts out using a bunch of judgement before anything even happens. Then, once you pick your spot you are judging how close to pull up to the front vehicle, how far back to go before turning the wheel, how far you are away from the curb and how far you are from the car behind you. All of these little judgments can make this a very nerve-wracking event for most people. The key is to calm down and practice. It is really not that bad.
Step 1: Check your mirrors and apply your turn signal as you slow down on the approach to your chosen parking space. As you are slowing down with your turn signal on, you are watching the car behind you to make sure that he notices that you are stopping. Sometimes, mid block like this, drivers aren’t expecting you to stop, so you’ll want to make sure that car is slowing down. Stop your car about even with the car to the front of your space, with your car about two feet away from the parked car.
- At this point, people become really nervous because now they feel like the entire world is watching them and they are holding up traffic. This is where you really need to calm yourself down, remember that your turn signal is on and that this is a perfectly legal move that is necessary on today’s busy city streets.
Step 2: Put the vehicle in reverse, turn the steering wheel all the way to the right, look out the rear window and begin backing into the parking space. As your front door passes the bumper of the front car, begin to straighten the wheel out and continue backing into the space.
- As you are backing up, be aware that there may be pedestrians, signs, mailboxes or newspaper boxes near the curb, so be aware of your surroundings. You don’t want to hit anything.
Step 3: When your front bumper is clear of the car in front, turn the steering wheel all the way to the left to allow the front of your vehicle to swing into the space as you continue backing toward the vehicle behind you. At this point you should be pretty close to the vehicle behind you and the curb.
- This is where you find out how you are doing. If your car was too close to the vehicle in front, then you may be too deep into the parking space by the time you are able to swing the front end in. If you started too far away or too far back you will be to far away from the curb or you won’t have enough room behind you to finish the move
Step 4: Turn the steering wheel back toward the right and pull forward to center your vehicle on your space and stop. You should be within one foot of the curb and at least two feet from the vehicle in front and to the rear of your vehicle. If so, park the vehicle just like in any other space, following all of the parking rules.
When you go to pull out of this space, you do it just like any other time you are pulling away from the curb. Mirror, turn signal, blind spot, pull out. Except, that if you are too close to the vehicle in front of you, you may need to back up a bit first.
Not too bad right? Remember, there are very few people that make this look effortless, but you can be one of them if you stay calm and practice. Also, if you get off on the wrong foot and it just doesn’t feel right from the start, sometimes it is better to abort and go around the block to start over rather than trying to adjust. But, if you are just a little bit off, a little adjustment might just do the trick. Don’t worry about traffic, they will be just fine, just use your turn signals and check your blind spots so that you don’t run into anyone and you will be fine.
There are a lot of judgments going on, the size of the space, the size of your car, how close to the car in front should you be, how far to go in reverse before you start to straighten your wheels, how far to go once your wheels are straight, will your front bumper miss the car in front, how close are you to the curb, how far back can you go, how close are you to the car in back? There are many little things that can go wrong, and having the wrong angle here or there can mess up your maneuver. It is sort of like playing billiards, once you get used to all of the angles involved, it gets pretty easy. Parallel parking is the same, once you get used to the car that you are driving and all of the angles involved it is really quite simple.
The photo above came straight out of the Wisconsin Motorist’s Handbook.