Typical woman driving a car too big for her

[Lewqa]

That’s what my work colleague (a woman) said whilst sat next to me this morning when I gave her a lift in. We were waiting to pass a car (SUV) in the work car park where the driver was taking a while to park, lining it up etc.

I have heard this sentiment before from others, it’s not the first time.

AIBU for saying that men are just as bad as women when it comes to their driving/parking ability with these bigger cars?

Often bigger cars come with lots more bells and whistles.
I drive a large estate car and park it much more easily as my husband much smaller car.
I've become so used to having a reverse camera in my car that I'm out of practice reversing without one.

I will be honest I am embarrassed when I see some women parking and reversing.

Sexist bollocks but I do wonder when I pass tiny women (occasional teen boy) whose eyes seem to be level with the steering wheel how on earth they manage to drive safely when they can't possibly see half the road in front of them.

well that told her, didn't it!

If you care enough about internalised sexism (which I agree this is an example of) to mull it over for half a work day and then start a thread about it, why not address it at the source and say something to her at the time?

I'm afraid IME it is more often women who do this. Men (not all men) are more likely to drive aggressively or speed, so it's not that one sex is worse at driving, more that each sex has its own faults (on average- of course I'm a brilliant driver as is everyone reading this).

She has no idea why a stranger bought the SUV she's judging them for owning or if they need it because of where they live or not. Us country folk do actually visit towns you know! Being in a town in our massive car doesn't mean we live there and don't actually need one!

She's just assigning a stereotype to them after seeing them drive it in public. That's my point.

Same here. We have 3 (nearly 4) children and a huge buggy so have a huge 7 seater SUV.

I actually find it a lot easier to park then our previous smaller car though. It has an aerial view of the parking plus all the sensors etc it’s great.
currently heavily pregnant so too big to fit in a normal parking space though 😅

The comment is sexist.
Some SUVs are just about too big for anyone.
Another one has been launched into a nursery very sadly too, and a 2 year old badly injured.
Sadiq Khan needs to look to Paris.

I note the driver in this latest incident is a woman.

DH used to work in haulage and warehousing. He said the best drivers of 44 ton lorries were usually the women.

I think you read a different post to me because that’s not what she said!

(also a country dweller).

I do know three women who don't drive on motorways.. I don't know any men that don't. We are conditioned to have biases... If I get cut up by someone who then slams their brakes on, I always assume it is a man. That said I drive a huge car and am way more competent at parking it than my male OH. I am a better driver all round to be honest but I have done it a lot more and are more confident. He would end up God knows where without a satnav and doesn't like doing unfamiliar routes... He does them but he isn't comfy at all. But I have been driving for forty years and he didn't learn until his mid thirties because he lived in London and it just wasn't a thing.

It may be a shock to some of the country bumpkins but people who don’t live in the back of beyond can still have good reasons for purchasing a large car. E.g. needing to cart lots of kid/ baby/ camping stuff on trips or going on holiday by car across Europe to self-catering accommodation where they need to take quite a lot of things for 2 or 3 weeks, people who have hobbies like cycling or surfing so need to fit large sports equipment into their cars even if they live in a town or city, people who have multiple children and need to fit multiple isofix car seats for safety, people who make long journeys to see family so need a car with sufficient space to travel comfortably with everything they need to take with them, people with small businesses and stock to move around, people with pets to transport as well as children, anybody who might need to do tip runs or go to IKEA etc with children in the car so requires decent boot space, and myriad other reasons, I’m sure.

I do agree though that there are many, many people on the roads who should not have driving licences. I have driven in maybe 15 different countries and it’s the same everywhere: the worst culprits are generally women who seem too terrified of driving to be on the road (so many threads on this website with them admitting this!), certain men in their 20s and 30s who drive recklessly and aggressively yet seem to be convinced that they are excellent drivers, and elderly people who also appear to be convinced that they’re excellent drivers because they drive 20mph under the speed limit in broad daylight and sunshine and are so slow and hesistant that they are often more of a danger than the reckless men who are trying to use their car to compensate for apparent lack of the esteem they feel they deserve when outside the vehicle.

The problem isn’t the type of car, it is that driving tests should be much stricter, repeated at regular intervals, and include motorway driving. Unless you can confidently handle city driving, night driving, country lanes, mountain roads with sheer drops, motorways etc, you should not have a driving licence. The whole point of it is that it’s meant to be varification that you have proved you are safe to handle any road situation, so I do agree that it’s ludicrous that there are people on the roads who cannot even park competently. That said, it’s a lot less dangerous that a lot of the other transgressions.

I’m a confident driver so it does annoy me if I see women in big swanky cars and they are clearly nervous and incompetent. That is several tonnage of metal they’re in charge of - it’s a road safety issue.

If you don’t feel that you can competently manoeuvre a vehicle of that size - don’t drive on a public road.

I have equal bugbears about male behaviours on roads but that’s a different thread.

I have to agree with this. Normally in a Range Rover.

Not saying I’d manage it either, which is why I drive a smaller car!

I think there is some truth in what your colleague said. You rarely see a man struggling to park ( I am not talking about the obnoxious type who park over 2 bays) not all of course, but usually when you see someone driving in and out of a bay, or struggling to parallel park, it is a woman.

I would love to drive a car that was the right size for me (5 foot). So I could turn round and see out of the back window like my husband does. So that I could comfortably have a seatbelt on that didn't rest on my neck. A seat, steering wheels, knobs that egonomically fit someone of my size.

But that car doesn't exist. Because the default size is average man size.
But we have an SUV with 360 cameras and a high driving position. And that's pretty good.

I know what she said. She hates them being bought just for height and safety. Fine. But then she goes on to make out that most are bought for that and I don't believe that it is true. I believe most are bought for utility, she clearly doesn't.

As I'm sure others have pointed out. When insurers were allowed to discriminate by sex, car insurance was always lower for women.

I have seen some terrible women drivers, far more then men. So many women can't park, myself included. Going into hiding now 🙈

Most of the people I see struggling with larger cars are women. It’s the reason I drive a Hyundai i10.

As a driving instructor I salute you for this.

Sadly many of the teenage girls I get can’t steer. Socialisation means that they’ve never got on a go kart or driven bumper cars. Girls are not pushed in that direction.

Personally I’d love to start a campaign to promote pre driving skills for girls and build confidence in women driving, but I’ve got too many learners to make it happen!

Doing all of those road types would be absolutely ideal but in reality isn’t workable. Some test centres have no motorways near them for example.

The test is stringent, and they are currently hard to come by for 17yo’s, so they certainly won’t open them out to retest full licence holders even if some are awful.

SUVs tend to be more difficult for women to park because we are shorter on average and, even with adjustable seats, don’t have the same visibility that men have. This means we have poorer line of sight to the markings delineating the parking space and of the space immediately to the front and rear of the vehicle. A large lower car tends not to have the same blind spots for female drivers than suvs, but visibility still tends to be more restricted than for men.

I think both men and women are equally shit at driving.

But I think men are more bold and convinced of their own driving prowess, especially when driving a big car, while women are less so.