Backing Up

Whose fault is it if I back out of a parking space and hit someone driving by behind me?

When we lived in Penticton we would often go to the beach after dinner, parking on Lakeshore Drive. This was nose in angle parking on the lake side of the two way street. If you were lucky enough to find a spot, parking was easy. However, leaving could be a problem, especially if something big was parked to your right.

A number of readers contacted me after I told a story about a man walking behind me when I was preparing to back out of a parking stall. These readers all advised me that I should back into parking stalls rather than driving forward into them. The benefits of doing this outweigh the convenience of entering the stall nose first in all cases but one.

Todd Fewer and Edward Powell live across the alley from each other in Vancouver but have never met. There is an ongoing issue with Mr. Powell having trouble backing out of his carport due to the position of Mr. Fewer's garbage bins. The bins are often knocked over and the garbage that they contained was not picked up by city crews.

Jennifer Harvey was riding her bicycle southbound on Ontario street entering the roundabout at Athlete's Way in Vancouver.  As she entered, she noted a car ahead of her that was stopped but had the backup lights on. Ms. Harvey did not decide to stop until the car began to back up, but by then it was too late, the car collided with her.

Is it legal to back out of a driveway across a lane of traffic?  I thought this wasn't legal but I can't find anything in the MVA.

Curious if you know if it is required by law for a school bus to honk when backing up. Reason I ask is the local school bus has chosen in front of my house as the drop and pickup point for 2 kids that live 1/2 a mile up the road. Not an issue, except every morning at 7 she lays on the horn and wakes me up.

I've started to take my own advice and back into parking stalls more often. There have been some unique experiences, mostly pedestrians that blithely march past the back of my vehicle ignoring the signal and backup lights, but there are drivers who want to go first and think second. Unfortunately, I'm going to have to include myself in that category this time around.

I had a bit of a scare the other day when I tried to back out of a space in a busy parking lot. There was a large van beside me blocking my view so I scanned as completely as I could and began to let up on the clutch. No sooner had I started to roll than a woman paying more attention to her smart phone than where she was walking appeared from behind the van. We both slammed on the brakes and after looking at each other for a moment, she continued on her way.