The story goes that women are not as good at parking as men, perhaps because they lack spatial awareness. However, covert surveillance in Britain’s car parks found that women are a little slower to park than their male counterparts but that their positioning within the space is much better.
The average British motorist parks a car just over 1000 times in their life. This equates to 9 days worth of parking for men and 12 days of parking for women. Looking at 7 components of parking, researchers from Germany found that women score 13.4 points on average, while men get 12.3 points out of the available 20.
Men are more skilled for driving forward into spaces, whereas women are more likely to use driving instructors’ preferred technique of reversing into parking bays. Women are better at locating available spaces, whereas impatient men miss free spaces by driving too quickly.
Women also seem to be better at lining their car up prior to starting to park with 75% get into a good position whereas just 50% of men do so. While professional instructors teach that bay parking should be done in reverse, just 28% of men did so compared to 39% of women.
Men are quicker at getting their car parked, taking just 16 seconds to do so, where women took 21 seconds on average to complete the manoeuvre. Perhaps this is why women are able to get their car parked in the middle of a space twice as often as men, with 52% of women managing a central park. Men are generally happier with their speedy park, with far fewer deciding to reposition their car after they have got it into the bay.
This research by Neil Beeson contradicts the figures from the Driving Standards Agency which said that last year thousands more women fail driving tests on parking errors than men.
