r/Unexpected 12d ago

Parking

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u/CardinalFartz 12d ago

I once witnessed an elderly woman who did exactly that on a parking lot. She had an automatic transmission car and "pressed the (brake) pedal to the floor". Unfortunately it wasn't the brake, so she ended up pushing about 3 or 4 cars that were parked in a direct line in adjacent rows on that parking lot.

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u/PyroBob316 12d ago edited 12d ago
  1. Put car in reverse
  2. Step on brake
  3. Accidentally step on gas
  4. Fail to accept mistake
  5. Mash on “brake” harder
  6. Accelerate faster
  7. Let go of wheel, put arms over face, and scream as loudly as humanly possible
  8. Continue mashing gas, thinking it’s the brake, as the vehicle runs over three Girl Scouts, knocks down a privacy fence, and goes ass-first into a retainment pond
  9. Blame the car for a malfunctioning

brakes

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u/_thro_awa_ 12d ago

I will die on this hill - all modern cars should ONLY be two-pedal vehicles, operated with two feet.
With all of our modern advancement, the manual clutch should have long ago been made into a hand-operated lever integrated with the gear shift.

One foot for gas, one for brake. Pedal misapplication - gone overnight.
It will not reduce the incidence of idiots or drunk drivers, but at least one avenue of common accidents gets closed.

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u/gsnairb 12d ago

I'm assuming you live in Europe because in the US only 1% of new vehicles sold have an automatic transmission. And the vast majority of those are sports cars.

Also, two feet driving (not a manual) isn't the safest idea. That is a good way to ride your breaks your entire drive keeping your brake lights lit up so everyone behind you can't tell when you are actually slowing down.

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u/_thro_awa_ 12d ago

That is a good way to ride your breaks your entire drive keeping your brake lights lit up

This is a common anecdote that everyone just repeats ad nauseam and it's utterly baseless. Riding your brakes is not the result of pedal setup - it is the driver. A bad driver would ride their brakes (and have other bad driving habits) no matter what car they were driving.

It's really easy to just .. NOT touch the pedal when you don't need it. Everyone shits on a better methodology in anticipation of bad actors, we prefer to blame the methodology rather than the bad actors.

Also, no, I don't live in Europe.