I got pulled over a couple of months ago and the cop told me to put it in park. I wiggled the stick back and forth to show it was in neutral and they thought I was fucking with them and kept saying to put it in park. Idiots
Isn’t it best practice to park in 1st? So that if the handbrake fails the engine brake slows the car a bit rather than it being a free falling projectile.
Late reply, but no, not unless you are parked on a steep hill without any sidewalks. Leaving it parked in gear puts a great deal of stress on the clutch. Clutches aren’t very fun or easy to replace. If you’re on a hill with a sidewalk you should turn your front tires away from sidewalk on the incline, and towards the sidewalk on the decline.
I suspect OP still had the engine running. That said, a lot of Americans seem to drive automatics and never use the handbrake, arguing that the tiny little tab in the transmission can hold their fully loaded “truck”, so it stands to reason that there are people in the world who leave their cars out of gear and argue that the handbrake could not fail.
