‘Hope the dog dies, Louise!’ Why do we lose our minds over parking?

Parking is war. It was always going to end up with an architect going after a rheumatologist, allegedly with a knife, in one of Australia’s poshest suburban streets.

The architect, Louise St John Kennedy, is in Perth Magistrates Court representing herself against charges that she told the medical specialist, Prudence Manners, to “move your car, you f---ing dumb bitch”. Kennedy’s dog had a medical emergency. Manners allegedly replied, “Hope the dog dies, Louise.”

Illustration by Dionne GainCredit:

This prompted Kennedy to “momentarily lose control”, but the confrontation, she said, never escalated beyond “a debate”.

Manners told the court that Kennedy waved a knife in her face before grabbing her by the throat. Manners thought she was having a heart attack. Kennedy told the court she was not brandishing a knife, only an architectural tool, an angle finder ruler. (She denies holding the tool in a threatening manner and has pleaded not guilty to being armed or pretending to be armed in a way that may cause fear and common assault.)

I swear I’m not making this up. Louise St John Kennedy is 74. Prudence Manners is 81. Their parking disputes, in Chester Road, Claremont (Perth’s version of Louisa Road, Birchgrove), had been going on for a year.

The Prussian general Carl von Clausewitz defined war as “the continuation of policy with other means”. Whether those “other means” are a knife or an angle finder ruler, a sharply worded note under the windscreen wiper or a slashed tyre, matters less than the underlying anxiety that has brought us, as a society, to this point. Parking derangement syndrome causes people to change their plans, move homes, or just not go out. I’m sure the COVID lockdowns were a relief to many, saving them from fretting about parking, but, like much else in modern life, there has been a post-pandemic rebound, parking derangement syndrome returning with twice the force.

Claremont neighbours Prudence Manners and Louise St John Kennedy outside Perth Magistrates Court this week.Credit: 9News Perth

To almost quote another military genius, US General William Tecumseh Sherman, parking is hell. We all have our flashpoints. For some, it is getting parked in. For others, it is when someone has parked too close to a driveway and cuts off the angle for getting in or out. Some people’s blood is brought to the boil by the parker who can’t fit between the marked lines, a growing problem as cars get bigger and many parking stations remain in the 1970s.

For the Booker-shortlisted novelist Charlotte Wood, a special place in hell is reserved for “those who park at the end of the row, but leave themselves a little runway of needless space, too short for someone to park in but taking half a car space that could be used behind them if they weren’t such selfish motherf---ers”.

This is a subset of what I call “dickhead parking”: the driver who sees a two-car-long parking space and luxuriantly takes up both. When searching for a park in busy areas, I can be heard snapping, “Dickhead parking… dickhead parking…”

No hypocrite me. I sometimes return to my car to check that I haven’t dickhead-parked. More irritatingly, so I’m told, I’ve been known to direct my beloved to park in non-dickhead fashion. She says she doesn’t need a camera when “spider eyes” is the passenger. It’s not an endearment.

Parking police can book you for transgressions, including “not close and parallel”, which I have copped, and now neurotically check, re-check and re-re-check before re-parking. But police can’t book a dickhead-parker, which is where citizens’ action comes in.

Retribution must be judged finely, as the St John Kennedy-Manners case shows. Architectural implements are a step too far. But there must be some way of reining in the dickhead-parker when common courtesy and the social contract have failed. Perhaps selfish parkers need to be made aware…

Education is the answer! But before educating them, we need to catch them. If you see something, do you say something? I have done so – “Excuse me, if you just move up an extra metre, you’ll leave space for another car” – only to be looked at like a weird uptight white man and asked, “Who made you the parking boss?”

The parking boss! Images of Trumpian grandeur flashed before my eyes, as I’m sure they flashed before St John Kennedy’s. Oh, for a gold-braided uniform, epaulettes and a military-style peaked cap! The parking boss of the world! They must have had these roles in the German Democratic Republic, North Korea and Switzerland.

Alternatively, there is what George Orwell called “war minus the shooting”: sublimate aggression by turning parking into a sport. America is already there with the Parallel Parking Championship, held every October in Pittsburgh. Founded in 2021, the championship has attracted 476 entrants who fancy reverse-parking, under clock pressure, with an audience. I swear I’m not making this up either.

At last month’s 2025 championships, founder Dan Leber told caranddriver.com that he was inspired by his mother, who used to park expertly in tight spots and then announce her success, with commentary from passengers including Leber and her other son.

Contestants are given a six-metre space and are timed, starting when the reverse lights come on and finishing when the driver calls “Done!” Points are given for closeness to the kerb, but if they kiss the kerb, they’re disqualified. Allowances are made for vehicle lengths. Spotters and self-parking cars are banned, but sensors and cameras are allowed.

This year’s winner, college student Ephorm Freeman III, parked his 2013 Prius in a combination of six centimetres from the kerb and 13.38 seconds. Try that in your spare time. Or don’t. Like any sporting victory, it’s an aspirational goal. The all-time speed record is 4.40 seconds by David Caron, but in a very small car ending up some distance from the kerb. The median time is around 25 seconds. The all-time slowest park was a stately 112 seconds from Qiana Ristich. For kissing the kerb, 151 of the 476 competitors have been disqualified.

The US has the Parallel Parking Championship, held every October in Pittsburgh.

In his victory speech, Freeman shared his philosophy: “You’ve got to get uncomfortably close. Those bumpers are called bumpers for a reason.” It’s unknown whether Freeman dickhead-parks, but you don’t want to be parked near him is all I’m saying.

It’s hard to believe that parking can ever be enjoyable. But watching other people try? That sounds like a spectator sport. This year’s ninth-place-getter, Tyler Wilson, told caranddriver.com, “Everyone I know is here. My parents are here, my dad competed earlier, my boyfriend competed earlier, my neighbours are here cheering people on, I have two more friends in line that are about to compete, we get to see everyone and hang out, and it’s free and fun.”

Americans, eh. There might be hope for them after all.

For the rest of us, until we can turn parking into a sport, there is only impotent rage, OCD-like obsessiveness or, in extremis, architectural instruments. Or maybe – maybe – some of us should just relax and not let the tail of parking wag the dog of living. For Louise and Prudence, I only have one question. When you are drawing your dying breath and weighing up the meaning of your years, will you be asking yourself if you should have spent more or less of your lives thinking about parking?

Malcolm Knox is a journalist, author and columnist for The Sydney Morning Herald.