trombone

Maybe. I open this thread to hear some ideas from you, either if you already have the problem of the shifter behind you, or if you just wait for the frustration with shifter hopelessly stuck in P to happen. A very rewarding and lengthy thread (visited by oevr 54,000 people) started by admany2 (look it up) provides plenty of information on this problem and the DIY fix.
When I put back in place the repaired blocker piece and the box was still open I tested the shifter moving it from P to D and back several times. It worked amazingly smooth and there was practically no force or stress exerted on the blocker. So I was wondering where is the force coming from which can eventually break the blocker into pieces.
Two rather obvious hypotheses:
One force may come from our own hands if we try to remove the shifter from park before the solenoid actually releases the lock. The second may come from parking the car on a slanting road (even with very mild slope). Pushing the shifter in park, some weight of the car will be transferred from the transmission to the shifter lock and it is noticeably harder to pull the shifter out of the parking position than when the car was parked on a perfectly level spot.
You may try the following routine. When you park the car, move the shifter in neutral first and engage the parking brake. Next release the standard brake and let the car settle on the parking brake. Then move the shifter up in P.
When you start the car, keep your palm on the top of the shifter knob. Pushing the normal brake down there is a position when you clearly feel a tiny knock on the knob meaning the solenoid pushed the lever up. Now the shifter comes out of park buttery smooth and effortless. Move the shifter to any gear you want, release the parking brake and drive away.
I know we are on the run most of the time and hate to waste even a couple of seconds on messing with the parking brake, but I think there is a good chance it can save you big money at the dealership or a lot more time of repair work if you do it yourself.

alkemist

I would like to let everybody know that not always shifter gets stuck in park unexpectedly. In my case the sihfter would get stuck in park, but with slight force of me pulling on it, it would move on to the gears. This was going on for a week or so, every once in a while, not every time, sort of giving me a warning that something is about to go wrong. Unfortunately I ignored it and kept on forcing the shifter out of park whenever it gave me a problem until the day came and the shifter got stuck for good. Since I suspected the problem I got to the point right away, taking everything apart and removing the troublesome piece out of the shifter box.

WARNING: If you brreak the clip that attaches the shifter shaft to the transmission lever, make sure you secure the shaft to the lever with some sort of metal wire, since there is always a change the shifter will get disconnected from the tranny lever and prevent the car from starting. I learned it the hard way.