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(Maryland) MVA Drops Parallel Parking from Driver’s License Test
Montgomery County Media ^ | 5/19/2015 | Krista Brick

Posted on 05/20/2015 3:14:22 AM PDT by markomalley

If you listen closely you can almost hear a collective sigh of relief from 16 year olds across the state.

The reason – the Maryland Motor Vehicle Administration officially removed parallel parking as a required test element on the driver’s license test on a statewide basis starting today.

According to Buel Young, spokesperson for the MVA, the administration determined that completing a two-point turn and backing up are similar enough to parallel parking to eliminate the parking element from the test.

“The MVA consistently evaluates its assessments of both the knowledge and skills tests. In analyzing the skills test, it was determined that the currently used 2-point reverse turn, when combined with the on-road portions or the test, adequately assessed the individual’s ability to operate the vehicle,” Young told MYMCMedia Tuesday.

You can find out more about the MVA tests here.

Young said parallel parking is still taught in driving schools.

“We encourage everyone to know how to do it,” he said.


TOPICS: Government; News/Current Events; US: Maryland
KEYWORDS: driverslicense; maryland; mva; parallel; parallelparking; parking; test
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h/t WMAL

Classic Maryland leftism: if a person can't meet the standards, lower the standards.

1 posted on 05/20/2015 3:14:22 AM PDT by markomalley
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To: markomalley

Dumbing down.


2 posted on 05/20/2015 3:22:12 AM PDT by HotKat (Politicians are like diapers; they need to be changed often and for the same reason. Mark Twain)
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To: markomalley

Might as well just tattoo your license number inside your lip at birth.


3 posted on 05/20/2015 3:24:45 AM PDT by VTenigma (The Democratic party is the party of the mathematically challenged)
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To: markomalley

My wife would approve: she STILL can’t parallel park!


4 posted on 05/20/2015 3:31:21 AM PDT by Chainmail (A simple rule of life: if you can be blamed, you're responsible.)
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To: markomalley
According to Buel Young, spokesperson for the MVA, the administration determined that completing a two-point turn and backing up are similar enough to parallel parking to eliminate the parking element from the test.

Seriously? Those procedures are trivial next to parallel parking. If they were going to drop a skill from the test, they should have dropped backing up and kept the far more difficult task of parallel parking.

As if dealing with Maryland drivers wasn't enough of a challenge already...

5 posted on 05/20/2015 3:36:59 AM PDT by exDemMom (Current visual of the hole the US continues to dig itself into: http://www.usdebtclock.org/)
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To: markomalley

Let’s play bumper cars!


6 posted on 05/20/2015 3:37:48 AM PDT by Jack Hammer
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To: markomalley
It used to be you had 30 seconds or three attempts (whichever came first) to have both tires 10 inches or less from the curb. If you hit a cone, you flunked, if you didn't stuff the vehicle in there in time you flunked.

I can still do it.

7 posted on 05/20/2015 3:50:10 AM PDT by Smokin' Joe (How often God must weep at humans' folly. Stand fast. God knows what He is doing.)
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To: exDemMom

No doubt pushed through by master parker- Eleanor Holmes Norton. Next to go, pull-in angle parking.


8 posted on 05/20/2015 3:50:33 AM PDT by petercooper (And I was born in the back seat of a Greyhound bus... Rollin' down Highway 41.)
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To: markomalley

the sinister auto body lobby


9 posted on 05/20/2015 3:58:23 AM PDT by dontreadthis
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To: markomalley

Regardless of their reason, I think that parallel parking spaces are the most inefficient use of available road space out there. Unless you have absolutely no extra driving lane width available, angle-in parking is more efficient.

I can still parallel park, but don’t because there just aren’t that many of them around where I live any more. The only ones I see are at WalMart - where the handicappers have 10 feet on each end to pull in the van they’re supposed to be using (but don’t).


10 posted on 05/20/2015 4:06:19 AM PDT by Gaffer
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To: Chainmail

My wife still can’t reverse straight in the drive way let alone park between two vehicles.

She even questions how she passed her test years ago.


11 posted on 05/20/2015 4:07:19 AM PDT by manc (Marriage =1 man + 1 woman,when they say marriage equality then they should support polygamy)
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To: Smokin' Joe

I did it with a tractor trailer, not sure if they still require it with a CDL A now though.


12 posted on 05/20/2015 4:09:13 AM PDT by manc (Marriage =1 man + 1 woman,when they say marriage equality then they should support polygamy)
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To: markomalley

I don’t think this is about 16 year-olds; here in NJ there are masses of immigrants driving without a clue, and the “economic benefit” of having them here can’t be realized by car companies if they aren’t consuming (in this case, buying cars). A friend from India recently went back to visit his family, and he stressed that he had to get his license while he was there; when he returned he received a NJ drivers license by presenting his Indian license (he never took any test here). He is now driving a car on NJ roads without ever driving on the right side of the road or being tested for it.

Nothing being done today is for American 16 year-olds; there aren’t very many of them, and those feigning concern for them are selling their futures out today.


13 posted on 05/20/2015 4:11:47 AM PDT by kearnyirish2 (Affirmative action is economic warfare against white males (and therefore white families).)
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To: markomalley
I aced parallel parking in a 78 Chrysler New Yorker, I think the car was bigger than the space between the poles...
14 posted on 05/20/2015 4:18:07 AM PDT by fungoking (Tis a pleasure to live in the Ozarks)
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To: markomalley
the administration determined that completing a two-point turn and backing up are similar enough to parallel parking to eliminate the parking element from the test.

Huh??? How the heck are a two-point turn and backing up the same as parallel parking??????

15 posted on 05/20/2015 4:28:01 AM PDT by Opinionated Blowhard ("When the people find they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic.")
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To: fungoking

“I aced parallel parking in a 78 Chrysler New Yorker, I think the car was bigger than the space between the poles...”

Yep, ‘73 Coronet Wagon for myself.


16 posted on 05/20/2015 4:38:01 AM PDT by headstamp 2
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To: markomalley

My Mother tells of when she got her driver’s license in WI during the late 1940’s.

Had to take the test with a standard shift car and one part of the test was a stop sign on a hill. You had to stop, look and then get going again without killing the engine or jerking the grader’s head off.

Each office used it’s own hill and she said kids were out there practicing all the time.

Been lowering the standards ever since....


17 posted on 05/20/2015 4:38:22 AM PDT by PeteB570 ( Islam is the sea in which the Terrorist Shark swims. The deeper the sea the larger the shark.)
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To: kearnyirish2

Precisely.

Some of the worst drivers out there.


18 posted on 05/20/2015 4:39:19 AM PDT by headstamp 2
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To: markomalley
I'm okay at parallel parking and backing into relatively tight garages and parking spaces. My problem is that newer cars have so many blind spots that it's tough to see boundaries to the back and to the rear sides of the car.

Is it just me? The older, boxier cars with larger windows were much easier to maneuver.

19 posted on 05/20/2015 4:44:42 AM PDT by grania
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To: kearnyirish2

“... He is now driving a car on NJ roads without ever driving on the right side of the road or being tested for it...”

Found out years ago to get the same side drive as the traffic laws.

Was in a left side drive country for six months and had access to both right and left side drives.

A driver wants to be near the middle of the road. When driving a standard US car with the driver on the left you feel like you’re in the gutter and try and drift over to the right to get your body in the center of the road.

And after a couple of beers? The right side drive cars were popular after dark.


20 posted on 05/20/2015 4:46:18 AM PDT by PeteB570 ( Islam is the sea in which the Terrorist Shark swims. The deeper the sea the larger the shark.)
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