Automatic Parallel Parking Systems

I admire those who can grab a parking space close to their destination by parallel parking without any assistance other than their side and rear view mirrors. Even though this is a skill I was forced to learn in order to successfully pass my drivers test and get my license, which is about the last time I did it, I was just never comfortable with the procedure. Until recently, in order to parallel park a vehicle the driver would have to complete a few specific steps without error in order to avoid damaging their own car or another's and park their car in a space that could not feasibly be driven straight into but was large enough to accommodate the car when parallel parked.


Needless to say, I have walked many blocks to avoid parallel parking and risk hitting curbs, holding up traffic and possibly damaging my vehicle or one of the two I would have to get between. It can be nerve racking to have cars waiting impatiently behind you to back into your space-especially if you are not a pro and it takes a few tries. Thanks to modern automotive technology, one need not worry about losing the parking space closest to their destination due to lack of parallel parking expertise. Several car manufacturers now offer parallel parking assistance systems that basically park your car for you and me.



Often referred to as an Advanced Parking Guidance System (APGS), Parking Assist System and Automatic parking, parallel parking assistance systems actually help a car park itself and helps drivers avoid the hassles commonly associated with parallel parking. Although not completely autonomous on vehicles currently for sale and in production, these systems definitely take a lot of the hassle out of parallel parking. Now available in the 2008 Lexus LS, the system in general has been met with mixed reviews.


The various parallel park assistance systems installed in vehicles on the market today have different ways of sensing an available parking space and the objects surrounding the available space. Some work via sensors that are distributed throughout the front and rear bumpers of the car that act as transmitters and receivers. The sensors transmit signals that bounce off the surrounding objects and reflect the information back to the system. The vehicles computer will then estimate the amount of time it takes for the signals to return back to the system to analyze the location of surrounding objects. Other parking assistance systems have bumper mounted cameras or radar devices that are used to detect appropriate parking spaces and surrounding objects. The final result is still the same-the vehicles parking assistance system will detect the size of an appropriately sized parking space (6.5 feet longer than the car itself), all surrounding objects and the distance to the curb and then steer the vehicle into the space. Typically, the driver still must follow the notifications provided by the system that notify the driver to brake and stop when an appropriately sized parking space is identified, and then the driver must follow the system's prompts that will indicate when to shift into reverse and when to gently ease off the brake to move the car into the identified parking space.