Weird. Same exact thing happened to me this weekend!

 

I haven't heard of anything like that before and I couldn't find anything with a search. It almost sounds like the "park" indicator/sensor wasn't being engaged properly when you put the shifter into "P".

Unfortunately with intermittent electrical stuff like that, they never happen when you're at the dealer to have it looked at. Hopefully it goes away or starts happening full time so you can get it fixed. Good luck!

-Ryan

 

It was a bit frustrating, especially the first time - we were swapping parking places in my driveway, moving vehicles and I stopped on the roadway. By the time I got back in the jeep and attempted to pull forward there were oncoming cars slowing down and I couldn’t get it moving. I just turned to the oncoming drive and gave him the "sorry I stalled her look" LOL. The other driver didn't know I was driving an automatic and I figured it would buy me time to get it moving again. Being stuck on the street in front of my home didn’t feel like a dangerous place (its suburbia) but had I really needed to move my jeep - I don’t think I could get it out of the way fast enough.

I’m usually really diligent to ensure the jeep is fully stopped before shifting into PARK, I’m just trying to retrace my steps to see if it’s not a quirk of the transmission or brake systems? Since it’s an automatic, I’m either in drive or park, I never shift to neutral, or play with any of the other gears. So yeah, unless its starts smoking, making odd noises, leaking underneath or producing ongoing errors, I don’t see the point of going to the dealership. LOL Just strange.

 

Mine displays the message when my door isn't shut all the way and I'm on drive. Just confirm all of your doors are shut.

 

I agree. IMHO, the intent of the message is to warn you that the transmission is Not In Park when the driver attempts to leave the vehicle. Such is detected by the driver's butt not in the driver's seat, or the driver opens their door. To be safe, the computer will not allow the vehicle to move (disables throttle) when there is no driver.

If you are getting that message when neither is true, I would guess that one of the sensors is bad, and giving a false status to the computer.

My hybrid does the same sort of thing, because the driver might wrongly assume that with the gas engine (the ICE) off, the vehicle can't move. It can; under electric power.

 

a door is open when it says that

 

Mine keeps alternating between displaying that the Door Is Open and Not In Park.

Are you sure that your transmission is in Drive when testing this?

 

Given that this happened to me twice on the weekend, with the second occurance happening while moving vehicles out of my driveway, I've played it over and over in my head. When I backed up my jeep, I was clearly at a full stop before placing the transmission in PARK. Got out, door was left open, engine running, ebrake engaged (bad habbit, but i use it all the time to prevent it seizing up, yes even on flat ground).
Then I got back in the jeep, removed the ebrake, placed it in drive to move forward and nothing happened. Got the "Vehicle not in park" message. Tried shifting it back into park, waited, then tried moving it back to Drive - nothing. Same message "vehicle not in park". So I shifted back to Park, released the foot brake, turned off the vehicle, turned it back on, waited for all the dash lights to turn off, then shifted to drive and everything was working again.
I'm still trying to figure out if there's a problem with the door sensor? the shifter? using the ebrake? So unless it happens again, there was almost too many things happening to properly diagnose.
Next time it happens (if it happens) I'll methodically go thur my actions to see what caused or fixed it.

 

Old post, but saw this tonight. Shut the Jeep off, Auto trans., in Park, left the door open, got my pizza, and started the Jeep. Message came on after shifting to reverse, "Not in Park" , "Door Open". So, it looks like a good safety feature to remind you the door is open, and you are not in Park.It's basically making sure you don't put it into gear with the door not fully closed.