Thinking strongly about the new A6 to replace the old. One thing that bothers me though, is no door ding protection. Can't you just see those dents despite your best parking efforts?? They kill me when I get them. Why buy a car prone to this abuse? Just me?

I also make it somewhat of a habit to remember the license plates of the cars next to me if I *REALLY* have to park in a tight spot.

is the number of spots in the US labelled "compact" filled by SUVs. I can't say that I blame the drivers too much, since the designers fill parking lots with small spots, when if you just look around you will see that this is a nation of trucks. Both the A6 and BMW 5 lack side strips, so we are screwed.

Don't get me started on SUV's. I hate them and the frequent soccer-Mom's that are behind the wheels driving them haphazardly. It seems so often that the SUV's are driven by those least competent to be driving a large vehicle...

The compact-only spots need to be strictly regulated IMO. I would ticket them until they get the idea. So often, you see an SUV driver cramming into 2 compact-only slots.

As to the side-guards....it seems that many of the upper scale cars don't have them. Not sure why. Honestly, though, they don't protect from door dings that well anyway given the differing heights of cars/SUV's/mini's/etc.... I've seen a lot of cars with dings ABOVE the door guards. I'm in favor of Kevlar plating!

I find it highly entertaining to laugh at them in the ditch after inclement weather (ask the moron I watched put a $85K Cayenne Turbo into a guardrail exiting the Garden State Parkway. Hello?!? Overprice AWD does not allow you to bypass physics). You can also snicker when they're filling up. They're too busy crying over that $60 tank of gas to do anything else.