I've run into people like the guy who wrote this article a few times over
the last year or so-- people who are bizarrely and inordinately concerned
with how other people park in parking lots. The most recent was a woman who
stopped me mid-park and went on and on about the fact that I was
inconveniencing everyone else by backing into the parking spot. Fascinated,
I asked her to explain herself rather than ignore her the way I do most
California kooks, and she couldn't tell me *how* I was inconveniencing her
and everyone else, just that I somehow was.

This author seems to think people back into spaces because they think
they're saving time. I can't speak for anyone else, but that's not why I do
it at all. I do it because pulling out of a parking space facing forward
with an unobstructed view of other cars and people (and small children and
pets) in the lot is orders of magnitude safer than backing out of the
space. And backing *into* the space doesn't come fraught with vehicles and
people moving around behind you in your blind spots. This has been borne
out by insurance company statistics.

And what about when both spaces are empty and you can do the pull-through?
Is that okay with this hall monitor dude or does that still violate his
sense of how the universe is supposed to work?

----------------------------
https://thefederalist.com/2023/01/06/for-the-love-of-all-that-is-holy-stop-backing-into-parking-spaces/

About a mile from where I sit typing this ensconced in my comfortable
suburban existence is a strip mall. This place serves a number of my
family’s basic needs, and I find myself going there quite a bit-- there’s a
grocery store, a couple of coffee shops, a dry cleaner, an immediate care,
a UPS store, an ABC, a sports bar, and a number of fast-casual restaurants.
And, of course, this is all connected by a large, sprawling parking lot.

Having traveled to this same establishment hundreds of times over a period
of years, I've noticed a dramatic change in driver behavior, and one that
has made running errands rather trying. I don't want to overstate the
problem, but after years of close study, I have arrived at the conclusion
that people who back into parking spaces are history's greatest monsters.

It would not be unreasonable to assume a couple of thousand cars are coming
and going from my neighborhood strip mall on a given day. Given that much
traffic, there's a basic formula for efficiency here: The time it takes to
get your car into a space added to the time it takes to pull out of the
space.

Now a great many drivers seem to be under the impression that, because
being able to pull out of parking space when you're already facing forward
is a little quicker than backing straight out of a space, this somehow
makes up for any extra time it took to back into the space. Please go to
your local busy parking lot with a stopwatch. I assure you, it does not.

Turning while backing into a space is a perilous process, exacerbated by
the relative narrowness of the channels between rows in a given parking
lot. That's because there's no room for error; one misjudged angle while
you're looking over your shoulder results in a small crunch that could cost
you a few thousand dollars, to say nothing of the insurance hassle. Even if
you think you're being relatively quick in backing up, there are powerful
incentives to make sure you're extra careful, i.e. slow, when backing into
a parking space.

Now contrast this with the traditional way of pulling into a parking space.
Due to the fact that about 99% of the turns we make are when we are driving
forward, our spatial awareness looking ahead is of course far superior. As
for backing out of a space, well, when you start with the car parked
already inside the space, you don't really have to judge any complicated
angles. You back straight out, confident there's already space on either
side of the car. You only start to turn when you're mostly out of the space
and the turning radius in relation to the cars on either side of you is
wide.

The fact that nosing into spaces and backing out was the norm in parking
for basically a century tells you all you need to know. The only reason why
large numbers of drivers recently got it into their heads they could back
into spaces with regularity is not that they all suddenly became better
drivers. It's that they started installing back-up cameras in every car in
the last decade.

But this is a total misunderstanding of what back-up cameras are for. The
most obvious reason for back-up cameras is safety, which ironically
obviates the one decent argument for backing into a space: You can clearly
see what's ahead of you when pulling out into a busy parking lot. Yes,
factory-installed back-up cams in decent cars come with lines overlaid on
the screen on the dash that ostensibly give you a good idea of the
dimensions of your car relative to the objects in the camera. You just have
to line things up like a video game or something and you're good to go.

Except I've now had enough back-up cams to know those lines on your screen
aren't always perfectly calibrated, and it's real easy to bump the tiny
camera on your trunk and get things out of whack. The aftermarket back-up
cam in my '06 Mercury Grand Marquis-- I know, it's a pretty sweet whip,
congratulate me later-- is just a video feed; it doesn't give me any
indication of where my car is. So while a back-up camera can obviously help
you back into a space in a pinch, if you think it's there because it
magically makes you able to quickly back into spaces anytime you feel like
it, you're delusional.

Now, of course, there are exceptions to every rule. I once watched a guy
back an F-250 into a space in front of the grocery store like he was
spinning three tons on its axis in about five seconds flat. I actually
applauded the guy. But however good a driver you fancy yourself to be, you
are almost certainly not a grocery store parking lot unicorn. Unless you
have good professional reasons to be behind the wheel a lot in difficult
circumstances-- I'd bet good money the driver of that F-250 had spent years
delivering payloads on job sites where the terrain was tricky-- you almost
certainly don't have that ability.

[NOTE: I wonder if having passed the US Secret Service Protective
Operations Driving Course and certified to have the skills necessary to
drive the president and other protectees in fully-armored vehicles while
evading hostile fire gives me acceptable skills to be allowed to back into
a parking space at my local Safeway.]

In fact, I'd be willing to bet virtually everyone reading this has at some
point in recent years complained about being held up in a parking lot by
someone backing into a space with all the speed and agility reserved for
docking the U.S.S. Nimitz. And worse, some of those people see this
happening with regularity but still continue to back into spaces
themselves, muttering to the dashboard saint they've erected to their own
ego, "Thank God, I'm not like those other people."

But wait, there are two final indignities that bear mentioning. When people
back into spaces, they're also cutting off access to their trunk or back
hatch. What if you end up buying something large or walk away from the
store having purchased more than you expected? I see this all the time when
people are trying to load stuff into the back of a car, where their access
is blocked off by a hedgerow or someone else's bumper. And there's rarely
room to wheel a cart between cars to get it closer to the trunk if you have
something heavy. When you pull forward into a space, the trunk is perfectly
accessible.

Lastly, even if you were dropped on your head as a child and are somehow
unpersuaded by the arguments I've made so far, I hope we can all agree that
backing into angled parking spaces should be a felony. Somehow this is a
real thing people do, despite the fact that backing into an angled space
requires making a 48-point turn going backward. And regardless, when you
back into an angled space, any attempt to exit that space begins with the
car pointed in the opposite direction of the flow of traffic, which is
inconsiderate, to put it mildly.

Now at this point, you're probably wondering-- who am I kidding, you were
wondering this about 800 words ago-- why do you care so much about this?
What's it to you if you have to spend a couple of extra minutes running
errands because some soccer mom has gotten it in her head that throwing the
minivan in reverse is an adventure for the whole family?

Well, it's not that simple. With thousands of cars coming and going from a
single lot, there's almost no delay or hold-up for other cars that doesn't
have much wider ramifications, triggering chain reactions that screw up the
traffic in the entire lot. In fact, the way civil engineers these days try,
and usually fail, to understand complex traffic patterns is by applying
chaos theory. So the same way that a fantastical chain of events starting
with a butterfly flapping its wings in the Congo leads to the stock market
falling 500 points half a world away, every extra 30 seconds wasted in a
parking lot is compounding existing problems and making overall traffic
worse in ways we can scarcely imagine.

BTR1701 <no_email@invalid.invalid> wrote:

>I've run into people like the guy who wrote this article a few times over
>the last year or so-- people who are bizarrely and inordinately concerned
>with how other people park in parking lots. The most recent was a woman who
>stopped me mid-park and went on and on about the fact that I was
>inconveniencing everyone else by backing into the parking spot. Fascinated,
>I asked her to explain herself rather than ignore her the way I do most
>California kooks, and she couldn't tell me *how* I was inconveniencing her
>and everyone else, just that I somehow was.

Do you have some sort of gypsy curse on you from a Stephen King novel in
which insane middle-aged white women appear out of nowhere and start
doing their Church Lady routine?

>This author seems to think people back into spaces because they think
>they're saving time. I can't speak for anyone else, but that's not why I do
>it at all. I do it because pulling out of a parking space facing forward
>with an unobstructed view of other cars and people (and small children and
>pets) in the lot is orders of magnitude safer than backing out of the
>space. And backing *into* the space doesn't come fraught with vehicles and
>people moving around behind you in your blind spots. This has been borne
>out by insurance company statistics.

That's true. In a parking lot, I yield right of way to someone who has
already started backing out of a space because I am aware that their
view is obstructed, but damn, the number of people who won't yield to
avoid a very common collision is astounding.

>And what about when both spaces are empty and you can do the pull-through?
>Is that okay with this hall monitor dude or does that still violate his
>sense of how the universe is supposed to work?

I hate when people do that because I shouldn't have to watch for vehicles
crossing over from other aisles. But sure, if there's no possible
conflict given the absense of another moving vehicle, who cares.

>----------------------------
>https://thefederalist.com/2023/01/06/for-the-love-of-all-that-is-holy-stop-backing-into-parking-spaces/

>. . .

BTR1701 wrote:
> I've run into people like the guy who wrote this article a few times over
> the last year or so-- people who are bizarrely and inordinately concerned
> with how other people park in parking lots. The most recent was a woman who
> stopped me mid-park and went on and on about the fact that I was
> inconveniencing everyone else by backing into the parking spot. Fascinated,
> I asked her to explain herself rather than ignore her the way I do most
> California kooks, and she couldn't tell me *how* I was inconveniencing her
> and everyone else, just that I somehow was.
>

I've always wondered why people do that, backing up.

I think it would be interesting to do a study of these people. Are they
all left-handed? Are they all in the autism spectrum? Are they
paranoid? They all tell you a story why they do it, but is is hiding a
more profound deficiency. I wonder what it is? :-?

--
[NOM] wrote:

> I do it because pulling out of a parking space facing forward
> with an unobstructed view of other cars and people (and small children
> and pets) in the lot is orders of magnitude safer than backing out of the
> space. And backing *into* the space doesn't come fraught with vehicles
> and people moving around behind you in your blind spots.

Actually there wouldn't be that much of a blind spot when backing out if
there wasn't an SUV on either side of you. There's this love of the SUV
as the new standard for family vehicles.

> Turning while backing into a space is a perilous process, exacerbated by
> the relative narrowness of the channels between rows in a given parking
> lot. That's because there's no room for error; one misjudged angle while
> you're looking over your shoulder results in a small crunch that could cost
> you a few thousand dollars, to say nothing of the insurance hassle.

Also how are you supposed to maneuver your shopping cart and load
groceries in the back of the car without swiping other cars even when
you're lucky enough to have three feet of space on the three sides.

On 2023-01-06 1:32 PM, Adam H. Kerman wrote:
> BTR1701 <no_email@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>
>> I've run into people like the guy who wrote this article a few times over
>> the last year or so-- people who are bizarrely and inordinately concerned
>> with how other people park in parking lots. The most recent was a woman who
>> stopped me mid-park and went on and on about the fact that I was
>> inconveniencing everyone else by backing into the parking spot. Fascinated,
>> I asked her to explain herself rather than ignore her the way I do most
>> California kooks, and she couldn't tell me *how* I was inconveniencing her
>> and everyone else, just that I somehow was.
>
> Do you have some sort of gypsy curse on you from a Stephen King novel in
> which insane middle-aged white women appear out of nowhere and start
> doing their Church Lady routine?
>
>> This author seems to think people back into spaces because they think
>> they're saving time. I can't speak for anyone else, but that's not why I do
>> it at all. I do it because pulling out of a parking space facing forward
>> with an unobstructed view of other cars and people (and small children and
>> pets) in the lot is orders of magnitude safer than backing out of the
>> space. And backing *into* the space doesn't come fraught with vehicles and
>> people moving around behind you in your blind spots. This has been borne
>> out by insurance company statistics.

I have been backing into parking spots almost as long as I've been
driving but I didn't start doing it out of any notions of safety. My
first car was a beater and on one occasion, I was parked nose-in and my
car wouldn't start. I wanted to boost the car but I was at the edge of
the lot and there were cars on both sides of me so there was no way on
earth another car was going to be able to get close enough to me to run
booster cables between the cars. If I had been parked tail-in, I
wouldn't have had that problem so I started parking tail-in and stayed
with it ever since. Only years later did I read that it was "one of the
top 10 safe driving tips" and I'm sure it's for the same reasons you
state. As you say, the insurance stats seem to bolster that reasoning.

As for saving time, I'm not remotely convinced that parking tail-in is
either faster or slower that parking nose-in. Tail-in takes longer to
park but getting out is dead easy; nose-in is fast to park but getting
out must take as long or longer than getting into a spot tail-in.

>
> That's true. In a parking lot, I yield right of way to someone who has
> already started backing out of a space because I am aware that their
> view is obstructed, but damn, the number of people who won't yield to
> avoid a very common collision is astounding.
>
Everybody always seems to be in a hurry.... Mind you, it's also common
to see cars coming from different directions in a nearly-full lot all
eager to swoop into the spot that is being vacated, regardless of if the
swooper just got there and someone else has been waiting. I'm sure there
have been road rage incidents over people disagreeing who was entitled
to that spot.

I still remember a time 35 years ago when I wanted to buy a pair of
boots at one of the major malls in Mississauga (a suburb just west of
Toronto). I drove around that lot for a staggering amount of time
looking for a parking spot but there were very few spots and someone
else always swooped in to a newly-vacated spot before I could get there
and sometimes took it simply by driving more aggressively, even though
I'd gotten there first. Finally, I figured out a strategy: follow
shoppers from one of the store exits, then follow them to their car so
I'd be first in line to take their spot when they left. I followed one
woman to her car, then waited for her to start the car and drive away.
Much to my aggravation, she started putting on makeup and after a couple
of minutes of THAT with no end in sight, I finally had enough. I'd been
in that damned parking lot for 45 minutes by then (it *was* a few weeks
before Christmas) so I decided to wait a few weeks and get my boots
another time. That did my blood pressure a lot of good :-)

>> And what about when both spaces are empty and you can do the pull-through?
>> Is that okay with this hall monitor dude or does that still violate his
>> sense of how the universe is supposed to work?
>
> I hate when people do that because I shouldn't have to watch for vehicles
> crossing over from other aisles. But sure, if there's no possible
> conflict given the absense of another moving vehicle, who cares.
>
>> ----------------------------
>> https://thefederalist.com/2023/01/06/for-the-love-of-all-that-is-holy-stop-backing-into-parking-spaces/
>
>> . . .

--
Rhino

BTR1701 <no_email@invalid.invalid> wrote:
> I've run into people like the guy who wrote this article a few times over
> the last year or so-- people who are bizarrely and inordinately concerned
> with how other people park in parking lots. The most recent was a woman who
> stopped me mid-park and went on and on about the fact that I was
> inconveniencing everyone else by backing into the parking spot. Fascinated,
> I asked her to explain herself rather than ignore her the way I do most
> California kooks, and she couldn't tell me *how* I was inconveniencing her
> and everyone else, just that I somehow was.

My first college apartment, somebody got their panties in such a bunch that
they actually put up signs saying you couldn’t back into parking spaces. I
asked why and they came up with the answer that cars overhang farther on
the back than the front so somehow if you back into a space you were using
more space.

Ignoring the basis of this “logic“ I pointed to my 1971 Gremlin and
explained that it didn’t extend over the back wheels at all.

The manager conceded the point. It may have helped that we were dating.

--
The last thing I want to do is hurt you, but it is still on my list.

On 2023-01-06 2:09 PM, super70s wrote:
>> I do it because pulling out of a parking space facing forward
>> with an unobstructed view of other cars and people (and small children
>> and pets) in the lot is orders of magnitude safer than backing out of the
>> space. And backing *into* the space doesn't come fraught with vehicles
>> and people moving around behind you in your blind spots.
>
> Actually there wouldn't be that much of a blind spot when backing out if
> there wasn't an SUV on either side of you. There's this love of the SUV
> as the new standard for family vehicles.
>
>> Turning while backing into a space is a perilous process, exacerbated by
>> the relative narrowness of the channels between rows in a given parking
>> lot. That's because there's no room for error; one misjudged angle while
>> you're looking over your shoulder results in a small crunch that could cost
>> you a few thousand dollars, to say nothing of the insurance hassle.
>
> Also how are you supposed to maneuver your shopping cart and load
> groceries in the back of the car without swiping other cars even when
> you're lucky enough to have three feet of space on the three sides.

That's the one situation where I will park nose-in if I'm anticipating
any trouble getting a shopping cart to the back door on my SUV.

--
Rhino

On 2023-01-06 3:05 PM, anim8rfsk wrote:
> BTR1701 <no_email@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>> I've run into people like the guy who wrote this article a few times over
>> the last year or so-- people who are bizarrely and inordinately concerned
>> with how other people park in parking lots. The most recent was a woman who
>> stopped me mid-park and went on and on about the fact that I was
>> inconveniencing everyone else by backing into the parking spot. Fascinated,
>> I asked her to explain herself rather than ignore her the way I do most
>> California kooks, and she couldn't tell me *how* I was inconveniencing her
>> and everyone else, just that I somehow was.
>
> My first college apartment, somebody got their panties in such a bunch that
> they actually put up signs saying you couldn’t back into parking spaces. I
> asked why and they came up with the answer that cars overhang farther on
> the back than the front so somehow if you back into a space you were using
> more space.
>
That *might* make sense if drivers backup up until their wheels hit the
edge of the parking lot and there was a sidewalk right along the edge of
the parking lot. But I would think most drivers would only back up until
their rear bumper was at the end of the parking spot, meaning no
possibility of overhanging a sidewalk that ran right beside the edge of
the parking lot.

> Ignoring the basis of this “logic“ I pointed to my 1971 Gremlin and
> explained that it didn’t extend over the back wheels at all.
>
> The manager conceded the point. It may have helped that we were dating.
>
As soon as you broke up, she went back to enforcing the "no backing in"
rules, right? ;-)
>
>

--
Rhino

On 1/6/2023 12:48 PM, Rhino wrote:
> On 2023-01-06 2:09 PM, super70s wrote:
>>> I do it because pulling out of a parking space facing forward
>>> with an unobstructed view of other cars and people (and small children
>>> and pets) in the lot is orders of magnitude safer than backing out of
>>> the
>>> space. And backing *into* the space doesn't come fraught with vehicles
>>> and people moving around behind you in your blind spots.
>>
>> Actually there wouldn't be that much of a blind spot when backing out if
>> there wasn't an SUV on either side of you. There's this love of the SUV
>> as the new standard for family vehicles.
>>
>>> Turning while backing into a space is a perilous process, exacerbated by
>>> the relative narrowness of the channels between rows in a given parking
>>> lot. That's because there's no room for error; one misjudged angle while
>>> you're looking over your shoulder results in a small crunch that
>>> could cost
>>> you a few thousand dollars, to say nothing of the insurance hassle.
>>
>> Also how are you supposed to maneuver your shopping cart and load
>> groceries in the back of the car without swiping other cars even when
>> you're lucky enough to have three feet of space on the three sides.
>
> That's the one situation where I will park nose-in if I'm anticipating
> any trouble getting a shopping cart to the back door on my SUV.
>
I generally put them on the passenger seat, reaching over from the
driver's side. If I have more than a bag, I put them on the driver's
side backseat or floor.

On 2023-01-06 5:06 PM, suzeeq wrote:
> On 1/6/2023 12:48 PM, Rhino wrote:
>> On 2023-01-06 2:09 PM, super70s wrote:
>>>> I do it because pulling out of a parking space facing forward
>>>> with an unobstructed view of other cars and people (and small children
>>>> and pets) in the lot is orders of magnitude safer than backing out
>>>> of the
>>>> space. And backing *into* the space doesn't come fraught with vehicles
>>>> and people moving around behind you in your blind spots.
>>>
>>> Actually there wouldn't be that much of a blind spot when backing out if
>>> there wasn't an SUV on either side of you. There's this love of the SUV
>>> as the new standard for family vehicles.
>>>
>>>> Turning while backing into a space is a perilous process,
>>>> exacerbated by
>>>> the relative narrowness of the channels between rows in a given parking
>>>> lot. That's because there's no room for error; one misjudged angle
>>>> while
>>>> you're looking over your shoulder results in a small crunch that
>>>> could cost
>>>> you a few thousand dollars, to say nothing of the insurance hassle.
>>>
>>> Also how are you supposed to maneuver your shopping cart and load
>>> groceries in the back of the car without swiping other cars even when
>>> you're lucky enough to have three feet of space on the three sides.
>>
>> That's the one situation where I will park nose-in if I'm anticipating
>> any trouble getting a shopping cart to the back door on my SUV.
>>
> I generally put them on the passenger seat, reaching over from the
> driver's side. If I have more than a bag, I put them on the driver's
> side backseat or floor.

That could work too. Mind you, I'd rather have things on the floor
behind the seats but that's just me ;-)

--
Rhino

On Fri, 6 Jan 2023 13:05:13 -0700, anim8rfsk <anim8rfsk@cox.net>
wrote:

>BTR1701 <no_email@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>> I've run into people like the guy who wrote this article a few times over
>> the last year or so-- people who are bizarrely and inordinately concerned
>> with how other people park in parking lots. The most recent was a woman who
>> stopped me mid-park and went on and on about the fact that I was
>> inconveniencing everyone else by backing into the parking spot. Fascinated,
>> I asked her to explain herself rather than ignore her the way I do most
>> California kooks, and she couldn't tell me *how* I was inconveniencing her
>> and everyone else, just that I somehow was.
>
>My first college apartment, somebody got their panties in such a bunch that
>they actually put up signs saying you couldn’t back into parking spaces. I
>asked why and they came up with the answer that cars overhang farther on
>the back than the front so somehow if you back into a space you were using
>more space.

I get that point as my apartment complex has one guy that parks by the
office where everyone walking to their office or to use the laundry
has to pass by the van on the sidewalk. The problem is this is one of
those extra long work vans and he often parks back into the spot so
far back that you can't pass by on the sidewalk. That's annoying when
you have to walk out into the street to get past this vehicle (as
there are plants on the other side of the sidewalk so that path is
blocked.)

>Ignoring the basis of this “logic“ I pointed to my 1971 Gremlin and
>explained that it didn’t extend over the back wheels at all.
>
>The manager conceded the point. It may have helped that we were dating.

I'm sure that had *nothing* to do with it. LOL.

anim8rfsk <anim8rfsk@cox.net> wrote:
> BTR1701 <no_email@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>> I've run into people like the guy who wrote this article a few times over
>> the last year or so-- people who are bizarrely and inordinately concerned
>> with how other people park in parking lots. The most recent was a woman who
>> stopped me mid-park and went on and on about the fact that I was
>> inconveniencing everyone else by backing into the parking spot. Fascinated,
>> I asked her to explain herself rather than ignore her the way I do most
>> California kooks, and she couldn't tell me *how* I was inconveniencing her
>> and everyone else, just that I somehow was.
>
> My first college apartment, somebody got their panties in such a bunch that
> they actually put up signs saying you couldn’t back into parking spaces. I
> asked why and they came up with the answer that cars overhang farther on
> the back than the front so somehow if you back into a space you were using
> more space.
>
> Ignoring the basis of this “logic“ I pointed to my 1971 Gremlin and
> explained that it didn’t extend over the back wheels at all.
>
> The manager conceded the point. It may have helped that we were dating.

So you were dating a crazy person.

Yep, that tracks. ;-)

In article <r08hrhhlpddrkodhpk0uljmhm27icb4kf6@4ax.com>, shawn
<nanoflower@notforg.m.a.i.l.com> wrote:

> On Fri, 6 Jan 2023 13:05:13 -0700, anim8rfsk <anim8rfsk@cox.net>
> wrote:
>
> >BTR1701 <no_email@invalid.invalid> wrote:
> >> I've run into people like the guy who wrote this article a few times over
> >> the last year or so-- people who are bizarrely and inordinately concerned
> >> with how other people park in parking lots. The most recent was a woman who
> >> stopped me mid-park and went on and on about the fact that I was
> >> inconveniencing everyone else by backing into the parking spot. Fascinated,
> >> I asked her to explain herself rather than ignore her the way I do most
> >> California kooks, and she couldn't tell me *how* I was inconveniencing her
> >> and everyone else, just that I somehow was.
> >
> >My first college apartment, somebody got their panties in such a bunch that
> >they actually put up signs saying you couldn¹t back into parking spaces. I
> >asked why and they came up with the answer that cars overhang farther on
> >the back than the front so somehow if you back into a space you were using
> >more space.
>
> I get that point as my apartment complex has one guy that parks by the
> office where everyone walking to their office or to use the laundry
> has to pass by the van on the sidewalk. The problem is this is one of
> those extra long work vans and he often parks back into the spot so
> far back that you can't pass by on the sidewalk. That's annoying when
> you have to walk out into the street to get past this vehicle (as
> there are plants on the other side of the sidewalk so that path is
> blocked.)
>
> >Ignoring the basis of this ³logic³ I pointed to my 1971 Gremlin and
> >explained that it didn¹t extend over the back wheels at all.
> >
> >The manager conceded the point. It may have helped that we were dating.
>
> I'm sure that had *nothing* to do with it. LOL.

I live on what's called a Rural Route, with individual mailboxes
mounted on posts at roadside. (RR 2 used to be part of my address.)
My neighbor insisted on parking in front of my mailbox because he was
too lazy or stupid to park in his own driveway. The post office
thought it was my car -- a not unreasonable assumption, if you didn't
know what was going on. This didn't get fully resolved until the son
of a bitch died.

BTR1701 <no_email@invalid.invalid> wrote:
> I've run into people like the guy who wrote this article a few times over
> the last year or so-- people who are bizarrely and inordinately concerned
> with how other people park in parking lots. The most recent was a woman
> who stopped me mid-park and went on and on about the fact that I was
> inconveniencing everyone else by backing into the parking spot.
> Fascinated, I asked her to explain herself rather than ignore her the
> way I do most California kooks, and she couldn't tell me *how* I was
> inconveniencing her and everyone else, just that I somehow was.

It's very simple: it takes longer to back into a tight spot then it
does to go in forward and being able to more easily see where you're
going. (And no, reversing cameras do not help since they are mostly
useless.) Since it does take longer, you're obviously holding up anyone
else who want to get past.

In some parking areas the parking spots are also angled, so to back
into it you would have to come down the aisle the wrong way ... or
perform a thousand-point reverse turn.

It's perhaps not so much of a problem in a quiet parking lot at your
local church on a normal weekday, but with parking spots at busy malls
or on a busy main road it holds up traffic.

'Parallel' parking spots are even worse, and should be totally banned.

Your Name <YourName@YourISP.com> wrote:

> BTR1701 <no_email@invalid.invalid> wrote:

>> I've run into people like the guy who wrote this article a few times over
>> the last year or so-- people who are bizarrely and inordinately concerned
>> with how other people park in parking lots. The most recent was a woman
>> who stopped me mid-park and went on and on about the fact that I was
>> inconveniencing everyone else by backing into the parking spot.
>> Fascinated, I asked her to explain herself rather than ignore her the
>> way I do most California kooks, and she couldn't tell me *how* I was
>> inconveniencing her and everyone else, just that I somehow was.
>
> It's very simple: it takes longer to back into a tight spot then it
> does to go in forward and being able to more easily see where you're
> going. (And no, reversing cameras do not help since they are mostly
> useless.) Since it does take longer, you're obviously holding up anyone
> else who want to get past.

But the people who park nose-in have to back out and that takes longer than
just pulling out frontwards, so *they're* holding people up on the other
end of the trip.

It's all a wash.

On 1/6/2023 2:15 PM, Rhino wrote:
> On 2023-01-06 5:06 PM, suzeeq wrote:
>> On 1/6/2023 12:48 PM, Rhino wrote:
>>> On 2023-01-06 2:09 PM, super70s wrote:
>>>>> I do it because pulling out of a parking space facing forward
>>>>> with an unobstructed view of other cars and people (and small children
>>>>> and pets) in the lot is orders of magnitude safer than backing out
>>>>> of the
>>>>> space. And backing *into* the space doesn't come fraught with vehicles
>>>>> and people moving around behind you in your blind spots.
>>>>
>>>> Actually there wouldn't be that much of a blind spot when backing
>>>> out if
>>>> there wasn't an SUV on either side of you. There's this love of the SUV
>>>> as the new standard for family vehicles.
>>>>
>>>>> Turning while backing into a space is a perilous process,
>>>>> exacerbated by
>>>>> the relative narrowness of the channels between rows in a given
>>>>> parking
>>>>> lot. That's because there's no room for error; one misjudged angle
>>>>> while
>>>>> you're looking over your shoulder results in a small crunch that
>>>>> could cost
>>>>> you a few thousand dollars, to say nothing of the insurance hassle.
>>>>
>>>> Also how are you supposed to maneuver your shopping cart and load
>>>> groceries in the back of the car without swiping other cars even when
>>>> you're lucky enough to have three feet of space on the three sides.
>>>
>>> That's the one situation where I will park nose-in if I'm
>>> anticipating any trouble getting a shopping cart to the back door on
>>> my SUV.
>>>
>> I generally put them on the passenger seat, reaching over from the
>> driver's side. If I have more than a bag, I put them on the driver's
>> side backseat or floor.
>
> That could work too. Mind you, I'd rather have things on the floor
> behind the seats but that's just me ;-)
>
I'm a mom, I'm used to putting my arm out over the passenger seat if I
have to make a sudden stop.

On 2023-01-06 2:09 PM, super70s wrote:
>> I do it because pulling out of a parking space facing forward
>> with an unobstructed view of other cars and people (and small children
>> and pets) in the lot is orders of magnitude safer than backing out of
>> the space. And backing *into* the space doesn't come fraught with
>> vehicles and people moving around behind you in your blind spots.
>
> Actually there wouldn't be that much of a blind spot when backing out if
> there wasn't an SUV on either side of you. There's this love of the SUV
> as the new standard for family vehicles.

Unless you've got a snub-nosed car, backing or fronting into a parking
spot doesn't make much difference. You'll have either a long hood /
bonnet or long driver-to-rear distance that creates such blindspots
when coming out of the parking space ... especially when a bigger car
or van parks next to you.

Plus there's alway idiot pedestrians to be wary of anyway.

>> Turning while backing into a space is a perilous process, exacerbated
>> by the relative narrowness of the channels between rows in a given
>> parking lot. That's because there's no room for error; one misjudged
>> angle while you're looking over your shoulder results in a small crunch
>> that could cost you a few thousand dollars, to say nothing of the
>> insurance hassle.
>
> Also how are you supposed to maneuver your shopping cart and load
> groceries in the back of the car without swiping other cars even when
> you're lucky enough to have three feet of space on the three sides.

Yep. If you back into a parking spot, there's no real way you can load
up teh trunk / boot with the shopping. The exception will be the rarer
parking lots that have walkways between the parking aisles.

Of course, on the flip side, trying to load the trunk / boot of the car
when impatient drivers and idiot pedestrians are going past can be a
problem too.

Rhino <no_offline_contact@example.com> wrote:
> On 2023-01-06 3:05 PM, anim8rfsk wrote:
>> BTR1701 <no_email@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>>> I've run into people like the guy who wrote this article a few times over
>>> the last year or so-- people who are bizarrely and inordinately concerned
>>> with how other people park in parking lots. The most recent was a woman who
>>> stopped me mid-park and went on and on about the fact that I was
>>> inconveniencing everyone else by backing into the parking spot. Fascinated,
>>> I asked her to explain herself rather than ignore her the way I do most
>>> California kooks, and she couldn't tell me *how* I was inconveniencing her
>>> and everyone else, just that I somehow was.
>>
>> My first college apartment, somebody got their panties in such a bunch that
>> they actually put up signs saying you couldn’t back into parking spaces. I
>> asked why and they came up with the answer that cars overhang farther on
>> the back than the front so somehow if you back into a space you were using
>> more space.
>>
> That *might* make sense if drivers backup up until their wheels hit the
> edge of the parking lot and there was a sidewalk right along the edge of
> the parking lot. But I would think most drivers would only back up until
> their rear bumper was at the end of the parking spot, meaning no
> possibility of overhanging a sidewalk that ran right beside the edge of
> the parking lot.

I think most people back in until their rear tires hit the curb.

>
>> Ignoring the basis of this “logic“ I pointed to my 1971 Gremlin and
>> explained that it didn’t extend over the back wheels at all.
>>
>> The manager conceded the point. It may have helped that we were dating.
>>
> As soon as you broke up, she went back to enforcing the "no backing in"
> rules, right? ;-)
>>
>>
>

Hee hee

--
The last thing I want to do is hurt you, but it is still on my list.

BTR1701 <no_email@invalid.invalid> wrote:
> anim8rfsk <anim8rfsk@cox.net> wrote:
>> BTR1701 <no_email@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>>> I've run into people like the guy who wrote this article a few times over
>>> the last year or so-- people who are bizarrely and inordinately concerned
>>> with how other people park in parking lots. The most recent was a woman who
>>> stopped me mid-park and went on and on about the fact that I was
>>> inconveniencing everyone else by backing into the parking spot. Fascinated,
>>> I asked her to explain herself rather than ignore her the way I do most
>>> California kooks, and she couldn't tell me *how* I was inconveniencing her
>>> and everyone else, just that I somehow was.
>>
>> My first college apartment, somebody got their panties in such a bunch that
>> they actually put up signs saying you couldn’t back into parking spaces. I
>> asked why and they came up with the answer that cars overhang farther on
>> the back than the front so somehow if you back into a space you were using
>> more space.
>>
>> Ignoring the basis of this “logic“ I pointed to my 1971 Gremlin and
>> explained that it didn’t extend over the back wheels at all.
>>
>> The manager conceded the point. It may have helped that we were dating.
>
> So you were dating a crazy person.
>
> Yep, that tracks. ;-)
>
>

In her defense may I just say that she’s not the craziest person I ever
dated?

--
The last thing I want to do is hurt you, but it is still on my list.

A Friend <nope@noway.com> wrote:
> In article <r08hrhhlpddrkodhpk0uljmhm27icb4kf6@4ax.com>, shawn
> <nanoflower@notforg.m.a.i.l.com> wrote:
>
>> On Fri, 6 Jan 2023 13:05:13 -0700, anim8rfsk <anim8rfsk@cox.net>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> BTR1701 <no_email@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>>>> I've run into people like the guy who wrote this article a few times over
>>>> the last year or so-- people who are bizarrely and inordinately concerned
>>>> with how other people park in parking lots. The most recent was a woman who
>>>> stopped me mid-park and went on and on about the fact that I was
>>>> inconveniencing everyone else by backing into the parking spot. Fascinated,
>>>> I asked her to explain herself rather than ignore her the way I do most
>>>> California kooks, and she couldn't tell me *how* I was inconveniencing her
>>>> and everyone else, just that I somehow was.
>>>
>>> My first college apartment, somebody got their panties in such a bunch that
>>> they actually put up signs saying you couldn¹t back into parking spaces. I
>>> asked why and they came up with the answer that cars overhang farther on
>>> the back than the front so somehow if you back into a space you were using
>>> more space.
>>
>> I get that point as my apartment complex has one guy that parks by the
>> office where everyone walking to their office or to use the laundry
>> has to pass by the van on the sidewalk. The problem is this is one of
>> those extra long work vans and he often parks back into the spot so
>> far back that you can't pass by on the sidewalk. That's annoying when
>> you have to walk out into the street to get past this vehicle (as
>> there are plants on the other side of the sidewalk so that path is
>> blocked.)
>>
>>> Ignoring the basis of this ³logic³ I pointed to my 1971 Gremlin and
>>> explained that it didn¹t extend over the back wheels at all.
>>>
>>> The manager conceded the point. It may have helped that we were dating.
>>
>> I'm sure that had *nothing* to do with it. LOL.
>
>
> I live on what's called a Rural Route, with individual mailboxes
> mounted on posts at roadside. (RR 2 used to be part of my address.)
> My neighbor insisted on parking in front of my mailbox because he was
> too lazy or stupid to park in his own driveway. The post office
> thought it was my car -- a not unreasonable assumption, if you didn't
> know what was going on. This didn't get fully resolved until the son
> of a bitch died.
>

Gads.

Mom had a literally crazy woman move in next to her. Her husband and son
brought her out from Ohio or someplace and told her they were going to live
in this beautiful multi million dollar house and then ditched her. She
insisted on putting her garbage cans in front of the mailbox And then went
nutso when the mailman wouldn’t leave her mail. Then she started blaming
the neighbors claiming we were secretly moving her cans to keep her from
being able to get her mail and left what can only be described as a death
threat on my mom‘s front door. She spread poison on the front yard I guess
to kill the weeds but it was covered with dead birds. She didn’t pay the
taxes and hid when the county troopers would show up so they came over to
me and I gleefully helped them and one joyous morning they came and got her
and dragged her away. They showed up about 8 AM but the paperwork said
8:30 and she refused to let them take her for a half an hour but then she
was gone and we never saw her again.

The next guy that moved in was the sun of a mobster who blew up a reporter
who was the father of a kid I went to high school with.

That was an interesting couple of years.

--
The last thing I want to do is hurt you, but it is still on my list.

On Fri, 6 Jan 2023 14:12:35 -0500, Rhino
<no_offline_contact@example.com> wrote:

>Everybody always seems to be in a hurry.... Mind you, it's also common
>to see cars coming from different directions in a nearly-full lot all
>eager to swoop into the spot that is being vacated, regardless of if the
>swooper just got there and someone else has been waiting. I'm sure there
>have been road rage incidents over people disagreeing who was entitled
>to that spot.
>
Absolutely - it's the reason why I never do Boxing Day sales anymore.
The spot I was going for was at the end of the row and this other guy
got mad at me when I took it - I was right next to the spot while he
apparently was round the corner and saw it.

He went apeshit on me yelling and everything - I just said "I've got
your plate number and if there's anything wrong with my car when I get
back I'm going straight to the police station with it"

I was so furious with myself for losing it even to that extent that I
having done Boxing Day sales since except the odd one online. (But
since I've got two external hard drives in bags still in their
original wrap that's unlikely any time soon)

On 1/6/2023 11:38 PM, anim8rfsk wrote:
> A Friend <nope@noway.com> wrote:
>> In article <r08hrhhlpddrkodhpk0uljmhm27icb4kf6@4ax.com>, shawn
>> <nanoflower@notforg.m.a.i.l.com> wrote:
>>
>>> On Fri, 6 Jan 2023 13:05:13 -0700, anim8rfsk <anim8rfsk@cox.net>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>>> BTR1701 <no_email@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>>>>> I've run into people like the guy who wrote this article a few times over
>>>>> the last year or so-- people who are bizarrely and inordinately concerned
>>>>> with how other people park in parking lots. The most recent was a woman who
>>>>> stopped me mid-park and went on and on about the fact that I was
>>>>> inconveniencing everyone else by backing into the parking spot. Fascinated,
>>>>> I asked her to explain herself rather than ignore her the way I do most
>>>>> California kooks, and she couldn't tell me *how* I was inconveniencing her
>>>>> and everyone else, just that I somehow was.
>>>>
>>>> My first college apartment, somebody got their panties in such a bunch that
>>>> they actually put up signs saying you couldn¹t back into parking spaces. I
>>>> asked why and they came up with the answer that cars overhang farther on
>>>> the back than the front so somehow if you back into a space you were using
>>>> more space.
>>>
>>> I get that point as my apartment complex has one guy that parks by the
>>> office where everyone walking to their office or to use the laundry
>>> has to pass by the van on the sidewalk. The problem is this is one of
>>> those extra long work vans and he often parks back into the spot so
>>> far back that you can't pass by on the sidewalk. That's annoying when
>>> you have to walk out into the street to get past this vehicle (as
>>> there are plants on the other side of the sidewalk so that path is
>>> blocked.)
>>>
>>>> Ignoring the basis of this ³logic³ I pointed to my 1971 Gremlin and
>>>> explained that it didn¹t extend over the back wheels at all.
>>>>
>>>> The manager conceded the point. It may have helped that we were dating.
>>>
>>> I'm sure that had *nothing* to do with it. LOL.
>>
>>
>> I live on what's called a Rural Route, with individual mailboxes
>> mounted on posts at roadside. (RR 2 used to be part of my address.)
>> My neighbor insisted on parking in front of my mailbox because he was
>> too lazy or stupid to park in his own driveway. The post office
>> thought it was my car -- a not unreasonable assumption, if you didn't
>> know what was going on. This didn't get fully resolved until the son
>> of a bitch died.
>>
>
> Gads.
>
> Mom had a literally crazy woman move in next to her. Her husband and son
> brought her out from Ohio or someplace and told her they were going to live
> in this beautiful multi million dollar house and then ditched her. She
> insisted on putting her garbage cans in front of the mailbox And then went
> nutso when the mailman wouldn’t leave her mail. Then she started blaming
> the neighbors claiming we were secretly moving her cans to keep her from
> being able to get her mail and left what can only be described as a death
> threat on my mom‘s front door. She spread poison on the front yard I guess
> to kill the weeds but it was covered with dead birds. She didn’t pay the
> taxes and hid when the county troopers would show up so they came over to
> me and I gleefully helped them and one joyous morning they came and got her
> and dragged her away. They showed up about 8 AM but the paperwork said
> 8:30 and she refused to let them take her for a half an hour but then she
> was gone and we never saw her again.
>
> The next guy that moved in was the sun of a mobster who blew up a reporter
> who was the father of a kid I went to high school with.
>
> That was an interesting couple of years.
>
You are supposed to _make_ movies, not _live_ them!

--
I've done good in this world. Now I'm tired and just want to be a cranky
dirty old man.

On 1/6/2023 11:38 PM, anim8rfsk wrote:
> BTR1701 <no_email@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>> anim8rfsk <anim8rfsk@cox.net> wrote:
>>> BTR1701 <no_email@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>>>> I've run into people like the guy who wrote this article a few times over
>>>> the last year or so-- people who are bizarrely and inordinately concerned
>>>> with how other people park in parking lots. The most recent was a woman who
>>>> stopped me mid-park and went on and on about the fact that I was
>>>> inconveniencing everyone else by backing into the parking spot. Fascinated,
>>>> I asked her to explain herself rather than ignore her the way I do most
>>>> California kooks, and she couldn't tell me *how* I was inconveniencing her
>>>> and everyone else, just that I somehow was.
>>>
>>> My first college apartment, somebody got their panties in such a bunch that
>>> they actually put up signs saying you couldn’t back into parking spaces. I
>>> asked why and they came up with the answer that cars overhang farther on
>>> the back than the front so somehow if you back into a space you were using
>>> more space.
>>>
>>> Ignoring the basis of this “logic“ I pointed to my 1971 Gremlin and
>>> explained that it didn’t extend over the back wheels at all.
>>>
>>> The manager conceded the point. It may have helped that we were dating.
>>
>> So you were dating a crazy person.
>>
>> Yep, that tracks. ;-)
>>
>>
>
> In her defense may I just say that she’s not the craziest person I ever
> dated?
>
Like that matters.

--
I've done good in this world. Now I'm tired and just want to be a cranky
dirty old man.

On 1/6/23 12:08 PM, BTR1701 wrote:
> I've run into people like the guy

You're talking about "backing into parking spaces" and "I've run into
people" is your choice of words? You are the most clueless fucking
asshole I've ever witnessed.

who wrote this article a few times over
> the last year or so-- people who are bizarrely and inordinately concerned
> with how other people park in parking lots. The most recent was a woman who
> stopped me mid-park and went on and on about the fact that I was
> inconveniencing everyone else by backing into the parking spot. Fascinated,
> I asked her to explain herself rather than ignore her the way I do most
> California kooks, and she couldn't tell me *how* I was inconveniencing her
> and everyone else, just that I somehow was.
>
> This author seems to think people back into spaces because they think
> they're saving time. I can't speak for anyone else, but that's not why I do
> it at all. I do it because pulling out of a parking space facing forward
> with an unobstructed view of other cars and people (and small children and
> pets) in the lot is orders of magnitude safer than backing out of the
> space. And backing *into* the space doesn't come fraught with vehicles and
> people moving around behind you in your blind spots. This has been borne
> out by insurance company statistics.
>
> And what about when both spaces are empty and you can do the pull-through?
> Is that okay with this hall monitor dude or does that still violate his
> sense of how the universe is supposed to work?
>
> ----------------------------
> https://thefederalist.com/2023/01/06/for-the-love-of-all-that-is-holy-stop-backing-into-parking-spaces/
>
> About a mile from where I sit typing this ensconced in my comfortable
> suburban existence is a strip mall. This place serves a number of my
> family’s basic needs, and I find myself going there quite a bit-- there’s a
> grocery store, a couple of coffee shops, a dry cleaner, an immediate care,
> a UPS store, an ABC, a sports bar, and a number of fast-casual restaurants.
> And, of course, this is all connected by a large, sprawling parking lot.
>
> Having traveled to this same establishment hundreds of times over a period
> of years, I've noticed a dramatic change in driver behavior, and one that
> has made running errands rather trying. I don't want to overstate the
> problem, but after years of close study, I have arrived at the conclusion
> that people who back into parking spaces are history's greatest monsters.
>
> It would not be unreasonable to assume a couple of thousand cars are coming
> and going from my neighborhood strip mall on a given day. Given that much
> traffic, there's a basic formula for efficiency here: The time it takes to
> get your car into a space added to the time it takes to pull out of the
> space.
>
> Now a great many drivers seem to be under the impression that, because
> being able to pull out of parking space when you're already facing forward
> is a little quicker than backing straight out of a space, this somehow
> makes up for any extra time it took to back into the space. Please go to
> your local busy parking lot with a stopwatch. I assure you, it does not.
>
> Turning while backing into a space is a perilous process, exacerbated by
> the relative narrowness of the channels between rows in a given parking
> lot. That's because there's no room for error; one misjudged angle while
> you're looking over your shoulder results in a small crunch that could cost
> you a few thousand dollars, to say nothing of the insurance hassle. Even if
> you think you're being relatively quick in backing up, there are powerful
> incentives to make sure you're extra careful, i.e. slow, when backing into
> a parking space.
>
> Now contrast this with the traditional way of pulling into a parking space.
> Due to the fact that about 99% of the turns we make are when we are driving
> forward, our spatial awareness looking ahead is of course far superior. As
> for backing out of a space, well, when you start with the car parked
> already inside the space, you don't really have to judge any complicated
> angles. You back straight out, confident there's already space on either
> side of the car. You only start to turn when you're mostly out of the space
> and the turning radius in relation to the cars on either side of you is
> wide.
>
> The fact that nosing into spaces and backing out was the norm in parking
> for basically a century tells you all you need to know. The only reason why
> large numbers of drivers recently got it into their heads they could back
> into spaces with regularity is not that they all suddenly became better
> drivers. It's that they started installing back-up cameras in every car in
> the last decade.
>
> But this is a total misunderstanding of what back-up cameras are for. The
> most obvious reason for back-up cameras is safety, which ironically
> obviates the one decent argument for backing into a space: You can clearly
> see what's ahead of you when pulling out into a busy parking lot. Yes,
> factory-installed back-up cams in decent cars come with lines overlaid on
> the screen on the dash that ostensibly give you a good idea of the
> dimensions of your car relative to the objects in the camera. You just have
> to line things up like a video game or something and you're good to go.
>
> Except I've now had enough back-up cams to know those lines on your screen
> aren't always perfectly calibrated, and it's real easy to bump the tiny
> camera on your trunk and get things out of whack. The aftermarket back-up
> cam in my '06 Mercury Grand Marquis-- I know, it's a pretty sweet whip,
> congratulate me later-- is just a video feed; it doesn't give me any
> indication of where my car is. So while a back-up camera can obviously help
> you back into a space in a pinch, if you think it's there because it
> magically makes you able to quickly back into spaces anytime you feel like
> it, you're delusional.
>
> Now, of course, there are exceptions to every rule. I once watched a guy
> back an F-250 into a space in front of the grocery store like he was
> spinning three tons on its axis in about five seconds flat. I actually
> applauded the guy. But however good a driver you fancy yourself to be, you
> are almost certainly not a grocery store parking lot unicorn. Unless you
> have good professional reasons to be behind the wheel a lot in difficult
> circumstances-- I'd bet good money the driver of that F-250 had spent years
> delivering payloads on job sites where the terrain was tricky-- you almost
> certainly don't have that ability.
>
> [NOTE: I wonder if having passed the US Secret Service Protective
> Operations Driving Course and certified to have the skills necessary to
> drive the president and other protectees in fully-armored vehicles while
> evading hostile fire gives me acceptable skills to be allowed to back into
> a parking space at my local Safeway.]
>
> In fact, I'd be willing to bet virtually everyone reading this has at some
> point in recent years complained about being held up in a parking lot by
> someone backing into a space with all the speed and agility reserved for
> docking the U.S.S. Nimitz. And worse, some of those people see this
> happening with regularity but still continue to back into spaces
> themselves, muttering to the dashboard saint they've erected to their own
> ego, "Thank God, I'm not like those other people."
>
> But wait, there are two final indignities that bear mentioning. When people
> back into spaces, they're also cutting off access to their trunk or back
> hatch. What if you end up buying something large or walk away from the
> store having purchased more than you expected? I see this all the time when
> people are trying to load stuff into the back of a car, where their access
> is blocked off by a hedgerow or someone else's bumper. And there's rarely
> room to wheel a cart between cars to get it closer to the trunk if you have
> something heavy. When you pull forward into a space, the trunk is perfectly
> accessible.
>
> Lastly, even if you were dropped on your head as a child and are somehow
> unpersuaded by the arguments I've made so far, I hope we can all agree that
> backing into angled parking spaces should be a felony. Somehow this is a
> real thing people do, despite the fact that backing into an angled space
> requires making a 48-point turn going backward. And regardless, when you
> back into an angled space, any attempt to exit that space begins with the
> car pointed in the opposite direction of the flow of traffic, which is
> inconsiderate, to put it mildly.
>
> Now at this point, you're probably wondering-- who am I kidding, you were
> wondering this about 800 words ago-- why do you care so much about this?
> What's it to you if you have to spend a couple of extra minutes running
> errands because some soccer mom has gotten it in her head that throwing the
> minivan in reverse is an adventure for the whole family?
>
> Well, it's not that simple. With thousands of cars coming and going from a
> single lot, there's almost no delay or hold-up for other cars that doesn't
> have much wider ramifications, triggering chain reactions that screw up the
> traffic in the entire lot. In fact, the way civil engineers these days try,
> and usually fail, to understand complex traffic patterns is by applying
> chaos theory. So the same way that a fantastical chain of events starting
> with a butterfly flapping its wings in the Congo leads to the stock market
> falling 500 points half a world away, every extra 30 seconds wasted in a
> parking lot is compounding existing problems and making overall traffic
> worse in ways we can scarcely imagine.
>
> And yet, the people backing into spaces are so selfish they haven't even
> tried to imagine the levels upon levels of "just because you could doesn't
> mean you should" that we decent citizens are dealing with every day on the
> mean streets of our local strip mall. If you're still backing into spaces,
> just cut it out and pull straight into the space the way basic geometry
> demands.

On 1/6/23 2:52 PM, Rhino wrote:
> On 2023-01-06 3:05 PM, anim8rfsk wrote:
>> BTR1701 <no_email@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>>> I've run into people like the guy who wrote this article a few times
>>> over
>>> the last year or so-- people who are bizarrely and inordinately
>>> concerned
>>> with how other people park in parking lots. The most recent was a
>>> woman who
>>> stopped me mid-park and went on and on about the fact that I was
>>> inconveniencing everyone else by backing into the parking spot.
>>> Fascinated,
>>> I asked her to explain herself rather than ignore her the way I do most
>>> California kooks, and she couldn't tell me *how* I was
>>> inconveniencing her
>>> and everyone else, just that I somehow was.
>>
>> My first college apartment, somebody got their panties in such a bunch
>> that
>> they actually put up signs saying you couldn’t back into parking
>> spaces. I
>> asked why and they came up with the answer that cars overhang farther on
>> the back than the front so somehow if you back into a space you were
>> using
>> more space.
>>
> That *might* make sense if drivers backup up until their wheels hit the
> edge of the parking lot and there was a sidewalk right along the edge of
> the parking lot. But I would think most drivers would only back up until
> their rear bumper was at the end of the parking spot, meaning no
> possibility of overhanging a sidewalk that ran right beside the edge of
> the parking lot.
>
>> Ignoring the basis of this “logic“ I pointed to my 1971 Gremlin and
>> explained that it didn’t extend over the back wheels at all.
>>
>> The manager conceded the point. It may have helped that we were dating.
>>
> As soon as you broke up, she went back to enforcing the "no backing in"
> rules, right? ;-)

I must have missed the part where he said the manager was a "she." It's
the 21st century, is hiding in the closet really necessary?