LONDON, England – Two-thirds of drivers in Britain – that’s about 21.4-million! – have, according to a survey by automaker Nissan, at some time forgotten where they parked their car.
A survey of 2000 car drivers showed about 33% ”lost” their vehicle at least once a month; another five percent fell into the trap every week. There are, of course, easy ways to avoid an extended stay in the city.
Christmas shoppers – thousands of them (probably with family) – in the UK could be stranded in the sleet and snow for as long as a half-hour hunting down their lost vehicle in car parks crammed with last-minute gift-buyers.
The overall average time to locate a lost car is 10 minutes, but five percent of respondents admitted the 30-minute panic.
Nissan’s survey showed the collective time wasted each year was about 35-million hours. The Corner says that’s not surprising, given that silver, black, and white vehicles predominate on the roads and that (despite automakers’ best intent) look much the same across a multistory car-park).
Stats say women are more likely to forget where they parked (72% vs. 58%). sorry ladies!) but they take less time to find their vehicles – 8.8 minutes on average vs. 11.9 minutes for men.
JOT IT DOWN – OR KEY IT IN!
Of the places drivers are most likely to misplace their vehicles, a multistorey car park came out No.1, closely followed by a shopping centre, supermarket and airport. Which is pretty dumb – avoid it by simply noting the floor and parking bay number of the issued ticket.
On a city scale, note the nearest junction to find the car-park – or use the heaven-sent mapping program on your darn cellphone, dummy!
Places most likely place to lose a car:
1 Multi-storey parking
2 Shopping centre
3 Supermarket
4 Airport
5 Town/City street
Only nine percent of of respondents overall had used a smartphone to track their cars with the 25-34 age range the most technically capable in this area – almost double the overall average.
Arun Prasad from Nissan UK told The Corner: ”In-car connectivity and smartphone apps let drivers use simple and accessible technology to mitigate against some of the everyday pitfalls of motoring –-such as forgetting where you parked your car.”
READ MORE Nissan features on Carman’s Corner
“Nissan Intelligent Mobility is changing the way we interact with our vehicles; helping drivers to locate their car is just one of the many benefits under our Intelligent Integration strategy.”
Or, The Corner suggests, go lowtech and, as suggested above, not the street, garage name, floor and slot number on the parking access ticket.
Have a great Christmas…!
Carman's Corner 
Ha ha! How true! I ‘lost’ my car in a multi-storey car park!