Leaving a parking space because someone else wants it

[Allisnotlost1]

I left the gym this morning about 8.15 and, as I did, saw someone arrive and drive the wrong way around the car park. It’s not huge but there’s an overflow which adds about 15-20 steps onto the walk back to the building. There’s also a second overflow which would add about 60 seconds.

I sat in my car to send a difficult emails - to do with bereavement - and I did this there so I could leave it behind and come home and focus on the day. It would have taken about 5 or 6 minutes.

So I start dealing with it and the wrong way driver an older lady, just for visualisation purposes, knocks on my window and asks me if I’m leaving. Yes, I say, it not for about 5 minutes. She asks me to ‘just pull out and wait somewhere’. I say I can’t, because you’ve driven the wrong way around the car park and now you’re blocking the exit. She insists she isn’t and she ‘needs’ the space because the car park is full. She hasn’t been to the overflow.

I look at her gobsmacked, but then ask where is it she expects me to go, and she then gets flustered and says don’t worry about. Ok I say, closing my door. When I left, there were a couple of empty spaces but by then she’d parked on the grass verge on the exit road.

AIBU?

YANBU - she should have used the overflow/s or driven around a bit like anyone else.

YABU - immediately leaving the car park at busy times is just the right thing to do.

I definitely don’t think considerate is mollycoddling, and I think I’ve made that clear. You referred to me as a twat and now want to talk about attitude and consideration so it’s hard to take you seriously to be honest.

I wonder what you think a forum is for if you object to people chatting about the minutiae of their lives.

I told her I’d be gone in five minutes and I was. By that time she’d already parked and closer spaces were empty. So I don’t think a couple of minutes inconvenience warrants quite your level of antipathy, but here you are wilfully being so.

Everyone has their reasons, and of course they don’t need to be explicit, but if they are not obvious then being explicit does make it easier, particularly if there’s no reason their needs trump someone else’s and no-one is harmed by one or the other taking precedence.

So the woman hassling the OP to move, when the OP was not done with the space - what do you call that?

I'd call that woman an awful and impatient cunt.

I'd much rather the OP safely do whatever was needed on her phone while parked vs doing while driving. The OP did nothing wrong.

Your ire is sorely fucking misplaced.

Do you kiss your children with that mouth?

I suppose in summary, nobody came away feeling good. Maybe the other woman would have expressed gratitude and thanks to you, had you moved. And you may have felt good for doing something that wasn't ideal for you but that helped her out.

Appreciate that from your POV she was inconveniencing you by interrupting you whilst writing a sensitive email. She was flustered, you were concentrating. You could see that she was flustered and perhaps not familiar with the car park. She could see that you were on your phone/device however she could not have been aware of what exactly you were writing - probably just assumed you were sending a quick text message.

And therefore... I still think you should have moved. 🙂

Ironically, I’ve noticed that it’s always people going to the gym that have got to have the closest car park and can’t possibly walk a few steps!

My DD used to attend a dancing school that was next door to a gym. The dancing school had about 12 parking spaces in total, which obviously didn’t go very far at busy after school times. The gym had about 5 parking spaces at street level and then a large car park (maybe 40 spaces) down the back. The dancing school parents would constantly get threatening emails about not parking in gym spaces, so generally didn’t do it. But the gym goers would constantly park in the dancing school spaces - their own big car park down the back would be practically empty but of course they couldn’t possibly walk round from behind the building, they had to park as close as possible to the door.

"I definitely don’t think considerate is mollycoddling, and I think I’ve made that clear.

I don't think you have made that clear. I commented about having consideration for other people and remembering that as people age there will be a higher likelihood of having certain issues and you took your response to the extreme, doing so means mollycoddling and patronising anyone with grey hair.

You referred to me as a twat and now want to talk about attitude and consideration so it’s hard to take you seriously to be honest."

Well tbh I didn't actually intend to call you a twat outright, I was referring to the behaviour being twattish and was replying to a comment about a specific detail, pointing out the lack of awareness that as people age they might appreciate a little more compassion. But you're right, it's was rude so fwiw I'm sorry for that.

"I wonder what you think a forum is for if you object to people chatting about the minutiae of their lives."

I don't object to that at all? I objected to lack of consideration.

"I told her I’d be gone in five minutes and I was. By that time she’d already parked and closer spaces were empty. So I don’t think a couple of minutes inconvenience warrants quite your level of antipathy, but here you are wilfully being so."

Eh? What level of antipathy? I don't think a couple of comments on MN exhibits anything of the sort. And yes, five minutes isn't much in a general sense, but in the context of sitting in the road with your car running without somewhere to park, it's long enough..and it was unnecessary.

"Everyone has their reasons, and of course they don’t need to be explicit, but if they are not obvious then being explicit does make it easier, particularly if there’s no reason their needs trump someone else’s and no-one is harmed by one or the other taking precedence."

Maybe it's baby brain, but I can't make sense of that last part. But my point was, lots of people aren't comfortable sharing private information with people. Especially if it's health related. She made it clear that she needed the space by going to you and asking for it. I just think the decent thing to do would be to let her have it. You had finished with the facilities and were leaving, you didn't actually need it anymore. Why inconvenience someone when you could so easily avoid it?

"So the woman hassling the OP to move, when the OP was not done with the space - what do you call that?

I'd call that woman an awful and impatient cunt.

I'd much rather the OP safely do whatever was needed on her phone while parked vs doing while driving. The OP did nothing wrong.

Your ire is sorely fucking misplaced."

Now now pottymouth 😂

@HelplessSoul I see you've made up a load of nonsense to justify your over the top reaction. Asking someone if they're leaving is hardly hassling.
But yes, you're completely right, the only options here were to hog a space in a busy car park or to drive with her eyes glued to a screen. In fact, OP probably saved lives today 😉

Don’t like cornflakes! 😉

🤣🤣🤣

Older implies elderly, what else would you mean by that 😅 in no way did I say that all old people are confused. Please have more consideration in the future and choose more appropriate places to send emails

This 100%

You said you objected to my posting about here - bitching, you called it.

There were places for her to park, she just chose not to go there, for whatever reason. She certainly did not indicate that she ‘needed’ the space, just that she wanted it. You’ve chosen to imagine that it was health related, based on nothing at all. I chose not to leave immediately, for reasons I’ve explained. You don’t need to agree with those reasons but asking why seems defunct at this point.

Of course older does not imply elderly, that’s your own interpretation! Just like I didn’t say that she was confused and I didn’t say anyone argued.

Ha, threatening emails jeez. There’s about five other kids clubs as well as the gym (and it’s a leisure centre really so there’s also sports hall, fields and swimming) so I never go in the evening because it’s terrible trying to park. Mornings are usually chill. Might just go running in future 😭

I think it’s just as reasonable to expect her to notice I was concentrating as it is to expect me to notice she was flustered. But it sounds like your view is to always inconvenience yourself first and that’s totally valid.

Maybe more people are like you than I’d have imagined. I might try knocking on windows to get spaces I want in future, rather than what I usually do which is drive further away.

I've made up nothing.

I merely used what the OP wrote in her OP.

Amazed you cannot see that - mind you, with the inherent bias you have - pot, meet kettle.... SMH 🤦‍♂️

Well you feel strongly enough to write about this ‘older but not elderly’ woman on the internet when you were clearly in the wrong. Please have more consideration for others going forward.

If in a busy car park I would drive to a quieter location to send the e mail or wait until I got home. It is actually quite annoying when people sit in their cars when spaces are few, like those who take up spaces to pick someone up. Read the room so you don't get others knocking on the window. Xx

I think it depends on whether it's a pay and display car park really. If you have paid and have time left on your ticket, carry on! If its a free car park and full then send the email outside your house and start fresh once your inside .

👍🏾

Good point!

Bit seems OP thinks she was right and that's that.
2 whole pages of her own posts going back and forth with anyone who sees it differently.

Agree - OP is NBU - Great suggestion / idea, I will remember & do this if i am in this situation - the OP obviously had very important issues that she had to deal with there & then - ie bereavement in this case - this was not out of spite, just her situation at the time. If I was just 'lingering' I may have moved, but this does not appear to be the case here.

😆 Yes a lot of my responses are bunched up aren’t they? What can I say, I responded when I could.

Ha! It would be very interesting to see what reaction you’d get. Very negative would be my strong suspicion. Because the reaction on MN doesn’t, I believe, reflect how wonderfully generous people are, always assuming the other person to be in the right no matter how impatiently or rudely their request is made, but rather the tendency to stick the boot into an OP.

Not bunched up, just 2 whole pages of OP's posts of you arguing.