PARALLEL PARK

When you have completed the manoeuvre you should be within 2 car lengths of the car that you have just reversed behind and parallel to the kerb.

I do wish that the DVSA would tell their examiners to state this in plain English. Instead of asking you to complete the manoeuvre ‘within 2 car lengths’, it would be much clearer to state ‘By the time you have completed this manoeuvre, there should not be enough room for another vehicle to park between the front of your car and the parked vehicle immediately in front of you’.

Sometimes it can be difficult to calculate whether you are within 2 car lengths or not.

An easy way to be sure that there is no room for a vehicle to park between your vehicle and the one you have just used for this manoeuvre, is to look for another nearby parked vehicle. Could the vehicle you are now looking at manage to park in the space in front of you? If there is not enough room for that vehicle to park between your car and the car you have just used for this manoeuvre, then you have completed the distance part of the Parallel Park correctly.

If there is enough room for another vehicle to park between you, then all is not lost, because you can now move your car forward to close the gap. When doing this, try not to get so close to the vehicle in front that you will find it difficult or impossible to drive out forwards when you have finished.