It is not only a great way to show you are master of your vehicular domain, but reversing into a busy car park is also just a better way to drive, experts say.
Monash University’s National Road Safety Partnership Program (NRSPP) has drawn up the pros and cons of reverse parking and nosediving, and concluded the former is not only safer, but saves time.
Although it was always up to personal choice – depending on car park layout and circumstance – NRSPP cited the UK’s Institute of Advanced Motorists’ conclusion: “reversing into a space meant cars were in a safer position for pulling away”.
Driving school owner Ben Ward agreed with the research, he told ABC Radio Brisbane that a car park was usually a “controlled space” with cars either side, no pedestrians, trolleys, or children in the area.
He said drivers typically have more control of their vehicle when driving into a space at a low speed than exiting into moving traffic.
“The logic behind it is if you’re just looking at the one activity of going into the car park, it’s quicker to drive straight in,” Mr Ward said.
“But if you’re looking at when you have to exit, it’s a lot easier to merge back into the traffic when you’re facing forward and people are likely to let you in.”
Reverse parking is also a standard safety practice on mining sites.
Monash’s NRSPP said reversing into a park increases visibility of potential obstacles and, with steering wheels “at the back”, makes manoeuvring the car more accurate.
It also said reverse parking occurs at the start of a shopping trip when people are “mentally fresh and quite aware of their surroundings”, rather than at the end of a shopping trip.
Reversing into a park also makes for a faster exit and means people will be “less vigilant on their way out”, it concluded.
However, it found that loading a car boot can be more difficult after reversing in – even if parking front first could mean loading while standing in the way of traffic. And that “head in parking minimised the risk of denting an adjacent parked car”.
But Mr Ward said there was “always a trade off”, and a matter of deciding whether to prioritise safety or the convenience of packing a car.
“It’s whether you feel safer in all that chaos at the back of the car in the parking lot or are okay for a couple of minutes of inconvenience to load the boot,” he told the ABC, adding it was a matter of “risk assessment”.
The Monash program, overall, concluded that safety should not be an issue if drivers use their mirrors and look around before reversing out.