Accident Exchange, the company that helps motorists (temporarily) exchange their current vehicle for a different one to drive about in when they’ve had a non-fault accident, unveiled an ‘eye watering’ statistic this week, with the revelation that precisely 1,273 parking prangs occur in the UK every day.
Even allowing for the fact that there are around 10,800 accidents daily that don’t involve anyone parking or trying to park, that certainly is a pretty ‘eye watering’ statistic, underlining, as it does, the literally terrifying risks we take each time attempt to park our vehicles or leave them parked somewhere where others might attempt to park adjacently.
Only rear-end shunts (most of which are not real accidents at all but the work of fraudsmen) surpass park-prangs in the CCC (Claims-Causing Collision) incident frequency table rankings compiled each month by the Auto Collision Damage Council (ACDC).
“UK drivers cause nearly three quarters of a billion pounds of damage annually simply by parking their cars,” warns a spokesperson for Accidental Sexchange. But apparently it’s not really the drivers’ fault.
Why? Because cars are getting wider and wider with every passing year, and because motor manufacturers are gradually phasing out car windows in favour distance-sensing parking aids and, ultimately, cars that drive themselves.
The fact that cars are now, on average, approximately one metre wider than the spaces in which we are supposed to park them, and are virtually impossible (as Boxster owners will confirm) to see out of, effectively absolves their drivers of any blame for parking ‘mishaps’.
So perhaps we should all get replacement vehicles following parking accidents, regardless of our status as either pranger or prangee.
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