You may be surprised to learn that more vehicle incidents occur, per mile driven, in parking lots than on public roadways. Often, these are low speed incidents involving backing or impact with fixed objects. The repair cost is typically relatively low and the events often go unreported, but the frequency is high. Parking lot and parking related collisions may represent twenty-five to fifty percent of a fleet's collision total.

There are several reasons as to why so many incidents occur in parking lots. Here are a few of them:

• Drivers understand the risks are high while on the roadway, but few recognize that risks remain high once off the roadway. As such, many drivers drop their guard and become less vigilant once they turn off the street and into a parking lot.
• Upon entering the lot, drivers are usually focused on seeking a parking spot…not on looking for other drivers or objects.
• Most drivers pull "head in" into a parking spot. Once in this position, they must then back out. The natural blind areas behind most vehicles, combined with vision obstruction due to vehicles parked alongside, often make visibility very difficult.
• Traffic laws are non-existent. Most parking lots are private property. Hence, drivers often roll through stop signs, travel against the directional arrows or cut between parked cars. Vehicles can be coming from any direction…at any time.

Putting all this together, it's clear the danger doesn't end once the driver reaches the parking lot.

Here are a few basic tips that you can easily apply to keep you out of trouble in this high risk environment.

• When possible, avoid backing. Most drivers seek the closest spot to their destination. This usually results in a head-in parking spot where there is the highest level of activity. Even if it's further from where you want to go, always look for a "pull-through" spot that will negate the need to back out and will place you away from the activity.
• If you are backing, it's always a good idea to get out and take a look first. If you have a passenger, ask him to get out and guide you. Nothing irks a safety director more than when a driver backs into something and there was a passenger who didn't get out and provide a second set of eyes.
• Move very slowly. There are simply too many people, vehicles and objects to identify and respond to when you're moving too fast. Slower speeds will buy you the time you need to safely see, think and do. The majority of drivers back or travel through parking lots too fast. This compromises their time to adequately scan the area and reduces the time other drivers and pedestrians have to react to your presence.
• Be sure to get the big picture. Constantly scan front, rear and side to side. All too often, motorists fail to see a threat coming from one direction because they're fixated on just one direction.

Just about everybody has had an accident in a parking lot, and almost all of them were preventable. If you apply the simple seeing and thinking skills described above, you can go a long way towards making sure it never happens again.