After some observations this weekend, I was left pondering why:
When parking in an absolutely empty car park, and nowhere near the entrance, do you often return to your car to find just one other car in the car park apart from your own, parked so close that you have trouble opening your car door.
Why do people do this?
Why, when descending from mountain passes, in thick orographic cloud causing bad visibility does almost every driver here feel they don’t need to turn on their car lamps apart from the front running lights?
Why, when planning to turn off a road to park within fifty metres or so, do many drivers try and dangerously overtake a slower vehicle just before they do so, thus saving themselves 3 or 4 seconds of their life, just before they are going to go on a hike all day?
Re 1. I always try and back into my spot, meaning most other cars driver’s door will be adjacent to mine - they have to leave enough room for them to get out of their car.
Re 2. Don’t know
Re 3. Don’t know, but I’m in not so much of a hurry these days.
Thinking about this for a moment. If you have (as you have hinted) been for a “hike all day” perhaps while you were away, the car park was full to bursting and by the time you came back to your car, the only one left happened to be the one parked next to you? This is probably quite common.
It happens when you park close to the entrance to the shops. I choose to park in that corner far from stairs or elevator and no issues at all. Plenty of people have mobility issues, so a 50+m walk keeps them away. Also, in an parking with 5 levels, I go to the level most distant from the entrance, It takes 1 min more.
Also, I choose to not go to parkings with ridiculously narrow spaces. There’s not much choice…should I go to the coop with narrow parking spaces or the coop with decent ones?
I’ve seen it before a few times - hence my questions.
This was on a Sunday when the shops are closed, in a supermarket carpark on an industrial estate - I wasn’t hiking - never said I was.
I sincerely doubt any other cars had used that car park that day.
Where I parked was neither near the entrance, nor at the furthest point away.
What you have written is interesting but is irrelevant to what I wrote.
I’ve seen it as well at campsites - those where you can pitch where you want.
I’ve put up a tent on an empty campsite, come back and found just one other tent on the campsite, right next to ours.
This is more an observation of human behaviour patterns.
Don’t you usually get allocated a pitch on a campsite, and it’s therefore out of your control? It’s likely that the camp management allocates pitches next to each other to fill up a row or section. Maybe next time ask the manager to put you somewhere away from the other people?
Maybe you just come across as an approachable easy-going care-free person that people just wanna be close to?
Being alone is a stressful experience for a lot of people.
It would be interesting to investigate if the people that parks too closely in an empty parking, or put the tent next to yours have some quirky anxiety issue.
Some sort of herding instinct, perhaps? Not really come across the too-close to open door thing in those circumstances though.
They nearly all have automatic lights these days, so most drivers don’t ever do anything with them. Except for those who insist on putting their rear fogs on when there’s a constant line of moving traffic. Grr.
I always try to park nowhere near any other cars if at all possible but have often seen the scenario you describe.
We saw a car do exactly that only this morning. He zoomed past us, had to pull in to allow an oncoming car to pass then zoomed around the car in front crossing a solid white line to do so before braking fairly violently in order to turn into the car park which was apparently his destination. It was completely bonkers and gained him nothing.
Because of the stupid rule of having daylight running lights. Drivers now forget to turn on their lights most of the time; tunnels, rain, fog, you name it they forget to do it. Worse than before they brought that rule in.
I guess I’m an introvert as I usually park away from other people and quite often drive the the top level to avoid parking next to other people.
Or I just like the walk.
The only time I park next (near) to other people is in a car park in a dodgy area with the idea that if someone is going to break into cars, given a finite amount of time, they probably won’t bother with mine.
As a cyclist, I take a totally sexist approach to the behaviour of motorists. Males tend to overestimate the size and power and their ability to control. Females tend to underestimate size but also have control problems. In both instances, their behaviour behind the wheel seems to be influenced by off-road experiences.
Parking is more a capitalist/socialist problem. Are you happy to share a common resource or do you want to own the whole car-park? Do you seek companionship or are you a lone wolf?
When I drive up into the mountains I’m often surprised by the permissive speed limits, especially in the wet… 80 km/h on a twisty road where a sneeze could end your life??
Nah, I’ll drive at a speed I’m comfortable with, and I have nothing to prove to the impatient guy flashing his lights behind me.
