AtTheGlen

Here are some thoughts. It would be interesting to hear from others, as well. As much as I have a Parking Processer working in my mind when I am about to park the car, I worry about dings and scratches less now than I did in the past. The new clear-coated surfaces are pretty strong. But I am always careful. In 2009, within a couple of weeks up picking up a new SL63, I came out from a grocery store and found that a grocery cart had rolled into a front fender panel. The car was black and the small dent was hardly noticeable, but until I forgot about it (passenger side), it was as if there was a huge red arrow pointing toward it. Nowadays those can be pulled out. Lesson learned - beware of slopes!, e.g., my parking garage comment where I avoid the ramp part of the garage so that someone's two-ton door doesn't swing into my car. I never park in "compact spaces" and try to shift over toward the left so I'll be closer to a passenger door (or maybe no one on that side) vs. a driver's door. As mentioned in the earlier post, I "profile cars" and avoid cars that are not being cared for. It's great when I luck into a "special space" - like you mention, walls, pillars, pie shaped spaces on a curved curb. Here in SoCal aka automotive La La Land, there seems to be more respect for a nice car, but I avoid stores and other places where a nice car could be resented. I don't take up more than one space as I've seen others do this and have a beater park as close to the nice car as possible. And I don't park in the middle of nowhere as I don't want to draw undue attention to my ride in certain areas. As mentioned in the earlier post, at stores I go to regularly, I'm seeing the same cars parked in spots all day - probably employees, so I can reduce risk in that area of the parking lot. Driver door vs. Passenger door next to me? Definitely passenger door at the gym where there is probably only one person in the car, but at a doctor's office or a grocery store where the passenger might not know how to handle the door opening as well (and it kills me to see people kick the door open and use the next-door car as a bumper), I might go for the driver's door. I have 12K miles on our '16 GT S Ed1 (Aug '15 delivery) and I only had one mark and that was on a wheel arch. It was touched up at the dealer and looks OK. I might sound paranoid, but I'm not. Just careful. It's like a game and the reaction from my wife is usually "just park the car". Oh, and I don't mind walking to get a better spot. Good luck and never let parking lot concerns take away from enjoying an awesome car like yours or mine. Have fun!