Women admit: We really can't park

More than one in four women will admit to changing their driving plans to avoid having to parallel park like this.

More than one in four women will admit to changing their driving plans to avoid having to parallel park like this.

Published Oct 31, 2012

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It is an an argument which has put many a relationship, at least temporarily, into reverse.

Now, it has finally been settled, by no less an authority than the AA. Women can’t park.

They really are worse than men when it comes to guiding the car safely into a limited kerbside space.

Nearly a third will change their driving plans to avoid having to parallel park at the end of their journey, twice the rate of men.

A study by the AA found that 16 percent of all drivers lack the confidence to parallel park.

But there is a big split between the sexes, with 25 percent of women drivers saying they are not happy doing it, compared with 11 percent of men.

AVOIDING CERTAIN ROADS

Twenty-eight per cent of women have altered their plans to avoid parallel parking, while only 14 percent of men admit to having done so. Many drivers have even blacklisted certain roads and car parks to avoid the manoeuvre.

The AA Driving School says “a plague of parking phobias” is blighting drivers, concluding: “Women are more likely than men to lack parallel parking confidence.”

Studies have suggested that men are more skilled at parking and reading maps because they are better at visualising three-dimensional pictures in their mind’s eye.

Figures from the UK’s Driving Standards Agency showed that in 2011almost a third of the 170 000 British women who failed their driving test for mistakes in reversing or failing to use their mirrors came unstuck on parallel parking.

Around 1.5 million people take the test each year. The pass rate is about 50 percent for men and 44 percent for women. - Daily Mail

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