Last year, officials at the Maryland Motor Vehicle Administration decided they would no longer test prospective drivers for parallel parking skills. A lot of folks immediately assumed this would substantially increase the pass rate.
Guess what? They were right.
Newly-released statistics show that yes, there's a reason why 16-year-olds feared the parallel parking test for all those years. Under the new exam, the passing rate for the year ending June 30 was 68.5 percent, compared to the last five years when it hovered between 48.8 percent and 56.1 percent, according to the MVA.
The parallel parking requirement was dropped on May 19, 2015 from the driver skills test. Why? Because officials argued that failing applicants for their parallel parking shortcomings wasn't putting better drivers on the road, it was just causing people to take the test over and over and bogging down the system.
Marylanders of a certain age likely still recall those anxious days of their youth practicing parallel parking in the local lot for several hours in order to pass the test. It made us better at parking downtown — possibly — but did it make us better drivers? All that focus on one specific skill might actually have been to our detriment — to the degree it denied us time to practice open road skills and maneuvering in traffic at far higher speeds that can more readily translate into life-or-death reactions and judgments — or at least that's the argument.
So I decided to test this theory up close. I recruited a 16-year-old of my acquaintance and spent the past year dutifully coaching him on how to safely operate a motor vehicle several hours each week (without charging him a fee, I might add). For the purposes of this experiment, we shall call him, "my son." His mother was often unavailable for this duty, as she values her own life and limb far more than she values mine.
After passing the written test and earning his learner's permit, the boy enrolled in a summer-long driver's education course, fulfilled his 60 hours of practice (including 10 at night) and drove through all kinds of conditions and weather. Little time was spent parallel parking, but there were many hours devoted to dealing with circumstances he's far more likely to encounter, including parking in lots and driveways.
Finally, the big day arrived. The necessary paperwork was completed. He pulled the car up to the corner waiting for his turn in line. An MVA examiner entered the vehicle immediately in front of us, and it was time to pull our car to the starting position. My rookie driver promptly hopped the curb with his front right wheel, leaving us in embarrassing circumstances.
A lot of thoughts go through a parent's mind at a time like this, including, "Did we discuss curbs?" After an interlude that seemed much longer than it actually was, he promptly righted the car and pulled to the correct spot, but I could tell he was a little freaked out by the faux pas. Minutes later, it was time for his road test.
The first obstacle? Passing the challenge that has essentially taken the place of parallel parking — backing into a standard-size parking space lined with traffic cones. From my perch on a nearby picnic table, I could not bear to watch. Would his nerves be settled? Would he be thinking clearly? Did we practice this enough?
To make a long story short, he aced the road-and-range test, joining the 150,220 Marylanders who similarly earned their ticket to drive in fiscal 2016. I can report (with no small amount of pride) that he's a better driver than I was at his age, more practiced and less easily rattled. But he also knows his limitations and the need to log more hours behind the wheel, license or no. Such prudence might be his best quality as a driver.
As someone once told me, the three most stressful moments of raising a child are potty training, college applications and learning to drive. Take parallel parking out of the equation, and it's still pretty darn stressful. Whether the boy is ready to park on the streets of Charles Village during rush hour is questionable, but by any other measure he's ready to roll.
—Peter Jensen