Can Anyone Explain Why Men Back into Parking Spaces?

Because they're closeted queers?


Right?

I think that it has to do with spatial perception. There are numerous studies that show that men, whether through genetics or social conditioning, perform better at certain spatial tasks.

I used to be concerned when I was driving in the middle of two large trucks. A guy said to me. "Don't look at the trucks. Focus on the hole between the trucks". I have never been afraid to drive between two trucks since then.

First off I will assume you don't mean parrallel parking because backing in is how you do it, although I have seen people try it the other way and laughed my ass off watching them. Second off, I will assume you don't mean they would back in if there was another space end to end with that one and you could just drive though and wind up in the gypsie position. The reason is that most men can and most women can't.

you get to the mall. Yo've got the 15 extra seconds it takes. However, after being dragged around shopping for hours and then leaving the mall with some small bag of something that smells good that happens to be the only thing your wife could decide on after a whole day.... you want to get the f**k out as soon as possible and that extra 15 seconds really means something. Time is relative ya know.

You're easy to teach, Phoenix. Putty in the hands of the pedagogue.

excluding music stores and boat shows of course....

My advice on driving between two large trucks would have been to not to if you can help it, but if you got to, then go like a bastard.

Have you ever been on 95, going from Florida to NY? There are more trucks on that road, and they are almost impossible to avoid.

I actually thought Phoenix was talking about parking between two trucks.

I pitied the woman.

Hey, Phoenix32890, given that you just wrote that, I will assume you avoided them, so congradulations are in order. So far I have never been in bad enough trouble to have to drive route 95 from Florida to New York.

I'm a girl and I sometimes back into parking spaces.

I do it because it seems I get pinned in by two huge trucks/vans/suvs/whatever and backing out of the space leaves a huge blind spot - you have to get way out into the lot before you can tell if it's clear.

Hey Boomerang, you can back into my space anytime you want so long as your wearing those gym pants.

I use one of those clip on panoramic rear view mirrors. Because the mirror is very wide, I am able to see much more than normally in that blind spot where a car is coming up on you on the left. By looking into the mirror, I can see a car next to me on the left out the side window.

me too for just the same reasons

I virtually always reverse into a parking space - it isn't hard, specially if there is a car alongside to use as a guide and it's sooooo much easier to drive out and be able to see oncoming cars that to reverse out blind. That I hate.

Men do this because it appeals to their "quick getaway" fantasies.

One of the things I like about my new home town is that I can find a tandem space in almost any parking lot - there aren't that many parking garages in the whole city. And most of these tandem spaces don't have curbs between them. So, one can park facing the aisle without ever having to back up; I love it. I've designed some parking lots myself and find both designing them and driving/parking in them fairly worrysome - the designing because of liability questions, and the driving, because people are just nutso re walking behind cars backing up, darting cross-lot, doing all sorts of bizarre maneuvers. The SUV/big pickup with campershell versus the, oh, Mazda miata, or in my case, Volvo station wagon, is a losing visual situation. And... I have one of those wide clip on rear view mirrors too.

Ok, does the desire to back in to a parking space explain why so many people drive the wrong way down the rows in the parking lot?

Well, the rows for 90 degree parking are wide enough, or should be by most codes, for two way 'traffic'.

I always prefer the drive-through parking spots, but reversing in - that's the way I was taught and still park for the most part (except my own driveway - used to - but got lazy in the last coupla years).