Transmission Freezeup - "Teach-In" heads-up

[Gar Blume]

During a late nite Chinese-food run, my Passion stalled on a hill at a stop sign waiting to make a left turn. The transmission froze/locked up in Park and the car wouldn't re-start. Bad time to forget my reading glasses. Fortunately, the person with me could read the owner's manual. While on hold for Smart roadside assistance for about 15 minutes, we finally found the couple of paragraphs about what to do. If this happens and the P in the display changes to 3 parallel/horizontal bars, turn the key to the off position for 30+ seconds. Then try to restart by holding the key in the start position for up to 30 seconds (this is not clearly stated in the manual). After a while, the bars were replaced by the P and shortly therafter the car started back up. I have no idea why this happened. I'd like to avoid this happening again. I love this car, but this wasn't much fun.

[SuperGeek]

Did you have to hold the key in the Start (#2) position for 30 seconds? I thought you just held the brake and then shifted through the gears after three lines showed up.

[JPaul]

Just in case, the Maintenance sub-forum starts with a sticky with FAQs. In it you can find lots of quick DIY fixes. I.e. check out the:
My Car Won't Start! [3 lines thru "P"]
Thank you.

[Gar Blume]

SuperGeek: I couldn't move the gear shift at all. And yes, I had to hold the key in the start position for about 25-30 seconds. I was so relieved that it worked.

[SmartCard]

Just to clarify.....if you stalled you would have been in drive to start, right? So were you first able to move it into Park, and the it froze, ....or was it stuck in D, but the display said park?