Lexus has offered an Advanced Parking Guidance System

For several years Lexus has offered an Advanced Parking Guidance System (APGS; also called Intelligent Parking Assist) option on its Lexus LS 460 and Lexus LS 600h, and the same system is offered in the 2010 Toyota Prius.

The Lexus/Toyota system was, and still is, the first and only system in the U.S. market to automatically steer the vehicle into both parallel and back-in parking spots.

ford active park assist 001

ford active park assist 001
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Now Ford is also offering its Active Park Assist feature on several vehicles, including the 2010 Ford Escape, Lincoln MKS, and Lincoln MKT. The system uses ultrasonic sensors, rather than cameras, to make the parking spot identification more accurate, by most accounts.

The Ford system gives a simple command on the instrument panel and uses ultrasonic sensors as well as camera sensors. Ford has shown its system to take 15-30 seconds, but we ended up taking much longer with the Lexus system because of the need to manually adjust the outline of the space itself almost each time.