Well, I scratched my goddamn car again. I’m so sick of this. I mean yes, it was technically avoidable, but the situation is bullshit. Let me explain the situation:
See that corner of my apartment complex lot? The orange box is a cut-out section of road around a drain (a few inches deep) with cones, the black shape is a trailer, and the green smudge is a pile of cinder blocks. See pictures below. My car is pretty small, but even moving 1mph around this stuff I can still feel my rear wheel hitting the ditch a bit. It’s tight.
See it better now? There’s even a cone knocked over because other people can’t get around. And, I know the trailer isn’t a responsibility of my apartment, but they can certainly ask the owner to park it in a better location. So yes, I can make it around barely and I have a few times, but this morning I tried extra hard to avoid the ditch and ended up scratching my bumper going a few mph more than the 1 it takes to maneuver safely. I agree, I should have crawled.
Here’s my car making the turn later to take pics. If you thought, “Try the other side” then this should show it’s too narrow. And, a car is there in that spot often. I don’t remember if it was this morning but I know I definitely couldn’t make it.
I stayed very clear of the curb in this picture (a foot or so) but even with this turn my rear tire went over into the ditch a tad as I rounded the far cone. There are at least 4 other similar cuts that have been around the lot for a while now. Some are easily avoidable at all times, but many depend on when cars are parked there. See another below.
So to sum up, I understand that there is technically enough space that I should have been able to avoid the scratch in my car. I’m an idiot. But I’m still really pissed at the apartment complex, and there’s no way other cars (SUVs? Trucks?) are dealing any better than I am. And now, I’m going to be out another (estimated) $700 when I get around to getting this fixed. I just want to drive this thing like a car, not a museum piece, but things like this keep happening and soon I’m just gonna walk to work. UGHHHHHHH.
Should I do something about this right away? I don’t think it’s just gonna rust away, right? Can I sand it a bit to clean it up? Or, should I just suck it up and go get it fixed for whatever cost?
UPDATE: The BASTARDS filled the holes hours after I did this. The holes have been around for over a month, and this sized for a week, and I missed it BY A FEW HOURS.