free4now
Thinks s/he gets paid by the post
- Joined
- Dec 28, 2005
- Messages
- 1,228
I just got into a bit of a dispute over a parking space. It's start of classes at the local community college, and because everyone is trying out different classes, the parking lot never has enough room. So all the students, myself included, are driving around the parking lot looking for the rare people pulling out.
I decide to pull over by the side of a row and just wait for someone to pull out, rather than driving around aimlessly. I've been waiting in one space at the end of a row of spaces for about 10 minutes, it's 10 minutes after the hour so classes are starting and tensions are high as people are worried about not getting into the class they want to take.
Salvation... someone walks over to a car and pulls out. But there is another car hunting down this spot. We both go for the spot, and soon he's trying to block me from going into the spot. At which point we open windows and both of us start telling the other about how long we have been waiting for the spot. I tell him I've been waiting 10 minutes right here, he says he has been following the person who pulled out as they walked though the lot.
Neither of us backs off, and because I have clearer access to the spot, I inch my way in while he tries to block me. Things almost get physical as he walks over and reaches into my window, opens my driver's door, and tells me to move my car. In the end I photograph him and his car and walk to my class.
Obviously, the easy answer is yield the spot, and under normal circumstances I would have, but in this case doing so could have caused me to not get into the course I wanted to take so I wasn't into being deferential.
The way I see it there are two rules:
- If someone else has been waiting longer, let them have the spot. But in the situation where everyone has been waiting at least a few minutes in different locations, determining who had been waiting longer may be impossible.
in that case the second rule applies:
- Whoever has access to the spot gets it.
I think I handled the situation well, but I wish there was a way to avoid such confontations; I haven't come that close to a physical fight in many years.
I decide to pull over by the side of a row and just wait for someone to pull out, rather than driving around aimlessly. I've been waiting in one space at the end of a row of spaces for about 10 minutes, it's 10 minutes after the hour so classes are starting and tensions are high as people are worried about not getting into the class they want to take.
Salvation... someone walks over to a car and pulls out. But there is another car hunting down this spot. We both go for the spot, and soon he's trying to block me from going into the spot. At which point we open windows and both of us start telling the other about how long we have been waiting for the spot. I tell him I've been waiting 10 minutes right here, he says he has been following the person who pulled out as they walked though the lot.
Neither of us backs off, and because I have clearer access to the spot, I inch my way in while he tries to block me. Things almost get physical as he walks over and reaches into my window, opens my driver's door, and tells me to move my car. In the end I photograph him and his car and walk to my class.
Obviously, the easy answer is yield the spot, and under normal circumstances I would have, but in this case doing so could have caused me to not get into the course I wanted to take so I wasn't into being deferential.
The way I see it there are two rules:
- If someone else has been waiting longer, let them have the spot. But in the situation where everyone has been waiting at least a few minutes in different locations, determining who had been waiting longer may be impossible.
in that case the second rule applies:
- Whoever has access to the spot gets it.
I think I handled the situation well, but I wish there was a way to avoid such confontations; I haven't come that close to a physical fight in many years.