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Had one of the school run dads park on our drive today, blocking both it and the heavily-used pavement* - when I asked him politely if he wouldn't mind not doing it, I found out that my life's that f***ing sad, he was only thirty seconds, and I don't even have a car (we do, it's just not there at the moment). Interesting how the default position is to attack.
How's your day going? 🙂
* There's single yellows applicable during pickup and drop off times, and people constantly breach them, as well as parking on the drives over the road. First time I've spotted one on ours, though - maybe because the car that's usually there isn't?
We had that once where we used to live. I discovered that you could jack up the front of the car and put a couple of breeze blocks under the sills so the wheels are just off the ground in less than 30 seconds.
For best long term deterrent, keep the breeze blocks near the end of your drive with "Please don't block the drive" painted on the side.
Only used them twice
I believe that with no car on the drive they haven't actually broken any law (ignoring the yellow lines, etc)
If you had a car on the drive and it prevented you from leaving - that is an offence.
[edit - googled it] - blocking a drive isn't an offence but parking over a dropped kerb is. That's an interesting one actually - we have the local school field opposite us and a kids football team uses it at the weekend making parking on a Saturday morning a bit of an issue as the parents then use up the spaces outside houses. I have at times parked in the gap where the dropped kerb is to our drive, as the only person I'm inconveniencing is my wife, but am I liable for 3 points and £100 for parking over 'my own' dropped kerb.
Also interesting. Over a dropped kerb is 3 points and £100 but if he actually parked on your drive, that's a civil matter and the police can't do anything about it. Unless you have appropriate signage visible day and night etc., or you might contract a Parking Co to do it for you.
On the school run normal rules don't apply.
Some muppet parked across our dropped kerb recently in a 4x4 the size of Belgium to drop her kid off. When I said my wife needed to get out to visit her patients she said we could wait 10 mins until she has dropped off her kid at school. There were plenty of spaces 100m down the road
Both Mum and kid are very big units and live 5 mins walk away. The walk would do them both a lot of good.
Interesting how the default position is to attack.
Modern life is stressful. There are many stressed, angry people out there who have poor emotional maturity. Our Prime Minister, for example, is a great example of the modern British citizen. The emotional maturity of a toddler, in the body of an adult.
Dangerous combination.
Similar thing here, lady in an enormous Ford pickup truck had driven to our village to walk her dog. On an otherwise empty road she parked fully on the pavement and blocking our path from the front door. When I politely asked her to move as we were expecting our shopping delivery, she looked at me and yelled "well, where else should I park?!?"
1. NOT on the frickin pavement. There's no need and we have a disabled boy on the road who regularly uses the footpath in his electric wheelchair.
2. NOT blocking someone's entrance.
3. On any other black piece of tarmac that you can see if you swivel your fat, vapid head from side to bloody side.
She then proceeded to argue that she can park where she likes at which point I kinda gave up and told her if she didn't bloody move it, I would and that she wouldn't like where I "parked it".
The sense of entitlement is just mind boggling. I would NEVER park in the manner that she did.
I discovered that you could jack up the front of the car and put a couple of breeze blocks under the sills so the wheels are just off the ground in less than 30 seconds.
Nice, and duly noted! 😀
I believe that with no car on the drive they haven’t actually broken any law (ignoring the yellow lines, etc)
If you had a car on the drive and it prevented you from leaving – that is an offence
Is that right? That's interesting - to be fair, he was fully across the pavement, if that might also count, so pedestrians either had to take to the road or dip onto our driveway*. Wasn't really thinking in terms of legality, more of how rude or otherwise it was.
* Didn't give it any thought at the time but while I was waiting for him to come back, onemum made a comment about walking on the drive because it's safer than the road - I wonder if she thought it was my car? 🙂
Modern life in the UK is stressful. We're under pressure to get to work and get our kids to school etc and there's no provision for doing this sensibly, so it all falls to us and we push ourselves to the limit to make it happen. It's shit.
When you look at how some things are actually managed, it's insane. We have to try and get our kids from school 2 hours before most of us finish work. There are't busses, and even then half the kids are to young to go home on their own so we have to somehow pick them up by car. But there aren't car parking facilities at schools.
It's entirely down to idiotic right-wing governments. If you want a strong economy and tax revenue then you need people working - so why make it so ****ing difficult all the time?
Our mountain rescue base is next to the local primary school. I was in base yesterday and needed to get the land rover out (not an emergency). School run car was parked in the zig zagged emergency vehicles area in front of the garage door therefore blocking me in. Luckily school run dad retuned after 30secs and jumped in and drove off.
We also had cars in the rear (private car park). I asked the mum who was there to not use the private car park, she immediately turned it around on me. She complained about everywhere else being busy, other car parks too far away and what was she meant to do. She then took a serious huff when I suggested that she leave 3 mins earlier and walk in from a public car park or, perish the thought, walk to school from home. She said I had a bloody cheek. I said she was in my car park and she needs to leave before I shut the barrier with her car still inside. I don't think we are going to be friends.
Another technique I have heard of but never tried is to get big A4 stickers and print the appropriate messaged such as "Please don't park here" or what ever you choose. When they do park there you stick the sticker on the windscreen like they do when you are wheel clamped.
Paper stickers wash off and do no damage to the windscreen so it is not criminal damage. It is just inconvenient for them
How’s your day going?
Marvellous so far thank you. Had a lay in, a cuppa and a decent breakfast. Might go park my van inconsiderately later for s***s and giggles.
On the school run normal rules don’t apply.
I used to be a lead-governor at a Primary and this was the cause of more complaints and hassle than pretty much every else combined including dealing with the L.A. and Ofsted. When it comes to dropping their kids off at school people just seem to turn into idiots.
We had a town with 4 schools (a primary, a through Primary, a High School and Private school) all on one narrow street, the Head of the Private school even started a mini bus shuttle service from the local Tesco CP to ease a bit of the congestions which was ignored of course, as how else would one be able to show off the other parents, other by being able to block more and more pavement with one's gigantic disco or Range Rover...
I had threatening letters, watched actual fist fights (both men and women, old young, rich and poor alike), watched parents push a wheelchair bound child (not theirs) out of the way to park in a disabled spot...chaos
Pavement parking does my nut in. 99% of the time its just so skull crushingly stupid. There is absolutely no logic to it.
On a normal road with two normal lanes. You park your car, which is roughly 2 metres wide, half on the pavement and half on the road.
Well done genius you've now blocked the pavement AND one lane on the road. Where as if you'd just parked on the ROAD, you know the bit where cars are meant to be, you would only be blocking one lane of the road.
Interesting to see molgrips seemingly being an apologist for these actions?
yesterday i parked across someone's drive, on the yellow zig zags outside a school.
The home owner came out and told me off.
I said sorry, felt bad. apologised again for being a dick. wont do it again. everyone has a bad day sometimes.
Not school run related but someone did this to us once, parking across our double drive blocking us both in. No-one non the street knew or admitted to knowing who it was. Unfortunately for them they left the car unlocked. We had three dogs at the time, you can hide a lot of full dog poo bags in a car. It didn't help but cheered me up no end, never saw it again unfortunately.
Can I just check. Is the size of the car important?
There seems to be a lot of rage against big 4x4 and such like. Does this make it better if you do the same with a Ford Fiesta or Fiat 500?
Just wondering why these never get a mention even though they appear to also be common offenders.
We have similar issue around our way. Less blocking drives but more parking on the corner zig-zags making it dangerous for kids coming in etc.
Local PCSO said that even though parking on zig-zags during schools hours in as offence, they're so under resourced they can't do anything about it - there's over 30 schools in her patch, so policing it just isn't feasible.
Threat of an actual fine from actual police/PCSO/warden is the only thing that seems to be a deterrent.
I discovered that you could jack up the front of the car and put a couple of breeze blocks under the sills so the wheels are just off the ground in less than 30 seconds.
I don’t understand the point of the breeze blocks. Sure, use a jack to move the vehicle, but what’s the point of putting it up on blocks? Unless you’re taking the wheels off?
yesterday i parked across someone’s drive, on the yellow zig zags outside a school.
The home owner came out and told me off.
I said sorry, felt bad. apologised again for being a dick. wont do it again. everyone has a bad day sometimes.
D'you know, I wouldn't mind that at all - like I say, I see it across the road most weeks but it's the first time I've noticed it on our drive. And I equally swear that I said, from a distance, with a smile, "would you mind not parking there?", as non-threateningly as I could. And he had to shut the door, come and stand... not toe to toe, but just off to one side, and without looking at me, tell me how sad I am, only 30 seconds, I don't even have a car, etc etc. Of course, once he's had the rant and he's back in the car at a safe distancer, THEN it's the stares and the ****er signs.
I wasn't going to have a go (and didn't) - I'd have been very conciliatory to contrition! But it's just the instant recourse to aggression, not because he's the right, but because he knows he's in the wrong.
I don’t understand the point of the breeze blocks. Sure, use a jack to move the vehicle, but what’s the point of putting it up on blocks? Unless you’re taking the wheels off?
The point is the inconvenience it causes the parking twerp, and thus a reminder not to do again.
I have similar issues, my road is a cul de sac that is used as the central parking point for the local primary school.
I have a double drive and only one side has a dropped kerb, so i have no legal standing if someone blocks me in and normally i dont have an issue as they will only be 5/10 minutes and i dont actually use my car to get to work so no biggie if i am blocked in.
One Saturday morning they must have had some sort of event at the school and someone parked and blocked me in, i saw them get out and politely asked if they would mind moving it so i could get out and then they could move back and block the driveway with no issues as i'll be out all day.
The torrent of abuse i got back was ridiculous, you'd have thought id asked them to give up their third child to allow them access to park.
I wasnt being unreasonable or horrible, literally just said "Excuse me im going out in a minute, can i just get my car off the drive?" she then re-iterated to me that i have no legal right as its not a dropped kerb, which i wholeheartedly agreed with and tried to say that im not stopping her, just asking if she can move it out the way for two minutes so i can get off the drive.
I have given up trying to reason with idiots.
Modern life is stressful. There are many stressed, angry people out there who have poor emotional maturity.
Certainly there are a lot of stressed, angry drivers on the roads...
The point is the inconvenience it causes the parking twerp, and thus a reminder not to do again.
<span style="font-size: 0.8rem;">Ahh ok. Seems to me they’re just stuck blocking your drive for longer that way. I’d rather move the car out with a jack. Leave it blocking the road (but not my drive) where it might get a ticket, or towed.</span>
Plus, blocks under the sills? Come on, that’s potentially microscopically scratching somebody’s precious pride and joy. You risk assault or litigation.
Can you tell I’ve put some thought into this? 🙂
Modern life in the UK is stressful. We’re under pressure to get to work and get our kids to school
Get out of bed 10 minutes earlier, makes things a lot easier. And walk a few hundred metres with your kids, it'll be good for you and them.
Can I just check. Is the size of the car important?
There seems to be a lot of rage against big 4×4 and such like. Does this make it better if you do the same with a Ford Fiesta or Fiat 500?
Just wondering why these never get a mention even though they appear to also be common offenders.
I reckon I see more bad driving from 4x4 owners than smaller cars. There was a study a while back that confirmed the BMW nob hypothesis, agressive drivers are more likely to own prestige brand cars eg BMWs. I suspect selfish, entitled people are more likely to buy 4x4s than smaller cars.
[i]Plus, blocks under the sills? Come on, that’s potential microscopically scratching somebody’s precious pride and joy. You risk assault or litigation.
Can you tell I’ve put some thought into this? 🙂[/i]
I did it about 20 years ago so less litigation at the time. I used a trolley jack to raise the back wheels off the ground to negate the handbrake and rolled the car clear of the drive. I then jacked up the front of the car (front wheel drive hatchback) and put the breeze block under the sills below the front doors. This was not designed to cause damage or danger, just inconvenience as they had to jack up each side of the car to remove the blocks. A polite note under the windscreen requested they didn't block residents drives in future.
Get out of bed 10 minutes earlier, makes things a lot easier. And walk a few hundred metres with your kids, it’ll be good for you and them.
Very much this. Thee is plenty of parking in our town for the primary school. Some people though regard it as their purpose in life to park within 100m of the school gates.
I don't get it though. Our neighbours drive their kids to school every day, every single day without fail. We are blessed that we have quite close access to an old railway line bike path. It spits kids out at the back of the school. A very pleasant 10 min bike ride. When my kids were at primary they rode as part of a little peloton, about 8 of them would meet up and ride in all year round. They did this form about P4 age but always with older kids. They enjoyed it, it was healthier for them, easier for me and better for environment. A complete no brainer. The kids next door (who all have bikes) have never ridden in. It seems a complete no brainer to me.
4*4s are harder to put on breeze blocks due to higher ground clearance so helps avoid their vigilante parking punishment
My main gripe with 4x4’s is in a city environment. They hold everything up. Plenty of streets with cars parked both sides for example, but still wide enough for two small cars to get through simultaneously. But not so with some massive Range Rover type thing. Plus they’re always so bloody precious about damaging the thing so they must have at least a metre clearance on each side…
If I had my way, all cars in cities would have to be tiny hatchbacks with massive bumpers. And you’re not allowed to claim from other people for ****ty little knocks and scratches. That should be seen as part of the consequences of using your personal possessions in the street.
Some people though regard it as their purpose in life to park within 100m of the school gates.
Too dangerous to cycle, there are all those 4x4s on the road.....
Also possible a social status thing, a bit like the faux Thatcher quote 'When I see a man on a bus, I see a man who has failed'. Just replace bus with bicycle etc.
dcwhite1984
Free MemberI have similar issues, my road is a cul de sac that is used as the central parking point for the local primary school.
I have a double drive and only one side has a dropped kerb, so i have no legal standing if someone blocks me in and normally i dont have an issue as they will only be 5/10 minutes and i dont actually use my car to get to work so no biggie if i am blocked in.
One Saturday morning they must have had some sort of event at the school and someone parked and blocked me in, i saw them get out and politely asked if they would mind moving it so i could get out and then they could move back and block the driveway with no issues as i’ll be out all day.
The torrent of abuse i got back was ridiculous, you’d have thought id asked them to give up their third child to allow them access to park.
I wasnt being unreasonable or horrible, literally just said “Excuse me im going out in a minute, can i just get my car off the drive?” she then re-iterated to me that i have no legal right as its not a dropped kerb, which i wholeheartedly agreed with and tried to say that im not stopping her, just asking if she can move it out the way for two minutes so i can get off the drive.
I have given up trying to reason with idiots.
Posted 2 minutes ago
You should have moved your car into the space she'd made, left it there and gone back inside.
If I had my way, all cars in cities would have to be tiny hatchbacks with massive bumpers. And you’re not allowed to claim from other people for ****ty little knocks and scratches.
I'm not convinced encouraging people to hit things with their car is a great idea, even if they're doing it in a tiny hatchback.
Can I just check. Is the size of the car important?
Not in the slightest, but to many posting on here it seems that large car equals natural entitlement.
We have various issues on our cul-de-sac at the weekend with inconsiderate parking when the forest car parks are full or people can't be arsed paying £6 for the car-park, a polite word often works and a suggestion that they actually pay to (help) maintain the facilities they intend to use.
Everyone is capable of doing something inconsiderate to others, even if what they do they do not consider it inconsiderate themselves.
I'd also argue the point that no-one has their own drop-kerb unless their property boundary and therefore maintenance requirements extend to the edge of said kerbing, they're LA owned.
Oh the angst it causes. Used to wind me up no end, not anymore. Yesterday a neighbor couldnt get parked in their drive so put their car in front of my house. Really apologetic to my wife for some reason. I couldnt believe it and insisted that if she ever finds herself stuck, my driveway is a free space for her. No big deal.
The one that really got my back up was the school run mums parking all over the place to save 20yds walk. All making it seriously dangerous for their precious offspring to cross the road. When i pointed this out once i was asked who the hell i was by more than one orange colour umpa lumpa. I realised that if the safety of their own children didnt convince them to walk a little further then they really can only learn their lesson the hard way. I havent read of any fatalities yet but its going to happen. Its on the bottom of a big slippery hill where cars cant even get up in the winter. Bus stops on both sides of the road with cars turning it into a big chicane with kids crossing or stood waiting. A bus coming down the road on a icy day could take out an entire classroom in one go. I wrote to the school to point this out but it wasnt taken seriously.
We are actually quite lucky with our primary school. It has a church adjacent to it and they let the school use the decent sized car park.
It still doesn't stop some people driving like utter ****s though.
A woman in an XC60 the other day managed to park at 45 degrees across two spaces. Despite the car park being busy, she had no problem with taking up two spaces. Just as she was returning to her car I parked correctly on one side and a Transit parked correctly on the other, effectively blocking her in.
I walked my daughter to the school gate at normal speed, but the caretaker is a mountain biker so I had a nice chat with him before I got back to my car 😀
Oh, ignore that (if you saw it). I've fallen into the STW trap of questioning/attacking the wrong thing. Catching isn't it?! 😆
Whilst Jon is (sadly) correct regarding kerbs etc and there's no law against parking on the pavement (unless you're in London where there's a bylaw), it is I believe unlawful to wilfully obstruct the highway / footway. So if you can't get a wheelchair past, they're breaking the law.
I think.
What about a non-aggressive No Parking sign?
agressive drivers are more likely to own prestige brand cars eg BMWs
Correlation vs causation?
I had a big daft German motor as a company car once (actually twice, an A6 Avant and an E-class Merc) (not by choice, it was all that was left in the pool and I got lucky). I found myself having to drive to the stereotype because no bugger gives you an even break, you indicate and rather than letting you out people accelerate to close gaps.
The trope about BMW / Audi drivers not indicating? Well that's why, it just tips the buggers off, you only have yourselves to blame.
What about a non-aggressive No Parking sign?
Brilliant.
Should the need ever arise, it's written into my house deeds that I have legally entitled passage down the back street for my horse.
tu es Parisien et je réclame mes cinq euros
jambourgie
If I had my way, all cars in cities would have to be tiny hatchbacks with massive bumpers. And you’re not allowed to claim from other people for ****ty little knocks and scratches. That should be seen as part of the consequences of using your personal possessions in the street.
I found myself having to drive to the stereotype because no bugger gives you an even break, you indicate and rather than letting you out people accelerate to close gaps.
I've heard that a lot but I found no difference in how I was treated in my 10 year old Mondeo and now in my 10 year old BMW. Maybe it's just new cars, or they're all being horrible to me all the time and I've not noticed.
My fake 60's sports car gets let out of junctions and given way more courtesy than the Range Rover ever was.
Whilst Jon is (sadly) correct regarding kerbs etc and there’s no law against parking on the pavement (unless you’re in London where there’s a bylaw), it is I believe unlawful to wilfully obstruct the highway / footway. So if you can’t get a wheelchair past, they’re breaking the law.
In Scotland it is or will be soon illegal to park on a pavements. If people do it near my I just pop all the wing mirrors in and lift the windscreen wipers. If I was pushing a pram I'd probably test the gap left my getting a run up.
Are parking rules different on a Sunday? I don't mind church goers going to church but the abandoning of cars is weird. We had one park in the end of our drive and they were parked on an area that is council owned but narrow so in effect blocking it. But that had to shuffle passed a half empty car park to commune with their diety.
I left school in 1981. There were absolutely no kids getting dropped off in cars.
What has changed, why can't they walk/cycle
anymore?
Edit,we have a friend who is a teacher and she's glad that due to covid ,mums can no longer take their kids into school and hang their coats up for them.
zippykona
Full MemberI left school in 1981. There were absolutely no kids getting dropped off in cars.
What has changed, why can’t they walk/cycle
anymore?
Posted 58 seconds ago
Reply | Report
Many families now have both parents working. You'll find a lot drop the kids at school then dash straight off to work.
It's too dangerous to walk to school with all the idiot drivers dropping their kids off at school.
I left school in 1981. There were absolutely no kids getting dropped off in cars.
I started high school about then. I was dropped off by a mate's dad for a while, but it was about 37 kids stuffed into the back of an Astra Max van.
Speaking of footpaths, I discovered today that people are getting quite militant about proposed advertising boards in Manchester.
After a bit of Googling.
"JCDecaux UK is expanding its national digital street furniture channel into a new major city..."
"In phase one, JCDecaux has begun installing 17 communication hubs..."
Digital street furniture channel? Communication hubs? Newspeak?
Try living in a tourist hotspot with house drive/parking overlooking the finest view.
We had multitude (like 10x a day) 'only going to be a few minutes' parked vehicles, from motorbikes to coaches.
The finest however was the day a Landrover/ off Road Owners Club day out saw two 110's parked in my back garden, on the lawn. They assumed it was thier pals, so drove 6 more vehicles in and set up a little ring of camp chairs.
They then argued with me that it wasn't thier fault that I didn't have a gate on our entrance...no apology, only grumpiness.
I am constantly amazed by how near to the school gate people insist on parking and causing a problem when there’s plenty of space a hundred metres away.
40 years of neoliberalism have turned large parts of our society into an incredibly selfish collection of individuals who will not consider anyone else.
Our offices are behind a posh estate agents, convenience store and handily a cycle shop. There is a driveway to access our yard next to the estate agents.
Quite regularly folks block the entrance, which is quite frustrating when loading and offloading. Especially if I've had to work a Saturday.
Before now I've blocked the driver in, so they bang on the office door demanding I move the van. So I make them wait, causing lots of anger and really busy, got to pick up/drop off kids etc.
There's a free carpark over the road.
The most angry tend to be the visitors to the estate agents with massive posh cars. A surprising number don't lock their cars, so I let off the handbrake and roll it into the road.
I don’t mind church goers going to church but the abandoning of cars is weird.
It's so bad near us at a Catholic church, the junction nearby is referred to in our house as "Our Lady of Perpetual Traffic Chaos"
I left school in 1981. There were absolutely no kids getting dropped off in cars.
Car use and the perceived danger has increased a hundred fold since then. I will take bets that a good 90% of parents don't want it to be like this, and would, if given half a chance, choose a different way. But schools are under pressure to maintain budgets and cycling or safe walking provision (something our parents and teachers didn't have to think about) are surprisingly expensive to maintain. It's easy for a head to swerve the whole thing by ignoring it and letting parents just carry on and it becomes it's own monster
no apology, only grumpiness.
People in cars are never wrong. Nobody anyone does with a car can ever be rationally argued against.
Eh, by ‘eck, I can remember walking to school, about half a mile or so, in the snow in the winter of 1963. Wearing shorts. I was the first lad at school to start wearing long trousers because it got so cold.
For those who can’t remember/didn’t know, it started snowing on Boxing Day, and the snow didn’t start to melt until March. I was eight at the time. I think there was only one family in the street who had a car, and they ran a taxi service.
As someone pointed out, a large part of the problem is working parents, probably working some distance from the home, needing to take the kids to school before work. Once kids get to a certain age, about nine/ten, they should be perfectly capable of getting to school on their own, either on a bike or walking, I see lots of the local kids walking, some of them walk about a mile or so, without needing to be driven.
In rural areas it’s not so easy, because many of the small schools that served villages closed years ago, so it’s necessary for parents to drive them to the nearest school, which might easily be five, six or more miles away, along narrow, dark and dangerous lanes with no footpath or lighting. Any child in Nettleton, which is out the other side of Castle Combe, would probably go to school in Yatton Keynall, and having walked part of that route, it’s bloody scary! Steep, with barely room for one car in places, and banks that drop straight down to the tarmac, not unlike South Devon. And public transport is a joke, don’t get me started on how inadequate that is!
Many families now have both parents working. You’ll find a lot drop the kids at school then dash straight off to work.
This doesn't explain though why they need to get to within 100m of the school gate. If they need to dash to work, why not drop them off 10 mins earlier and a short walk from school. Better for the kids, better for the congestion and gives them more time to get to work?
Don't ever suggest a school mum/dad should set off slightly earlier, rather than complaining they can't park right outside the school as it's in a 30's cul-de-sac where the resident's have to park on the street. Oh noo.. resident's are in the way. We ended up with police outside the school to stop the fights.
This stuff winds me up so much more than it should. It mind boggling the entitlement and thoughtlessness of so many people.
Theyve part pedestrianised the culdesac at the juniors entrance at school, with a bollard and everything, and parents just squeeze past it
"im just dropping my kids off"
OBVIOUSLY DICKHEAD, does the massive red No Entry sign not apply?
Ive seen one hurried abandonment on the zig zags that actually blocked the pedestrian gate!
Returned to their stupid car to a queue of people waiting to get around it.
The solution is easy. Cars are to Brits what Sacred cows are to Hindus. Nothing shall impede them, They are what Guns are to Americans, a God given right.
There should be a specific exemption passed into law that render Cars the objects they are...
“In phase one, JCDecaux has begun installing 17 communication hubs…”
folks in Brussels are sick of them so there is an anti-publicity game going on in November, various categories such as number switched off on one night, best alternative sign etc
https://zapgames.net/liberation-de-panneaux/
I kind of like this one:
and 😀 at theoatmeal cartoon
For those who can’t remember/didn’t know, it started snowing on Boxing Day, and the snow didn’t start to melt until March
That brings back memories. I was 13, just moved from London to Kent, A20 blocked by 10' drifts...
Two young children orphaned and the suggestion of a parking dispute 🙁
Where I live they've solved the problem by banning cars near schools during school hours. It works because everyone is within walking distance of their school
https://hackney.gov.uk/school-streets
franksinatra
This doesn’t explain though why they need to get to within 100m of the school gate. If they need to dash to work, why not drop them off 10 mins earlier and a short walk from school. Better for the kids, better for the congestion and gives them more time to get to work?
fossy
Don’t ever suggest a school mum/dad should set off slightly earlier
I can only speak for my own child's school but getting there early doesn't help with this.
You wait with your child until their class gets called in. If you park 10 mins away, obviously it adds 10 mins to the time you get into work.
I don't know why some people insist on parking on the same street as the school though, laziness probably, or a lack of parking available elsewhere.
Whatever happened to the consultation document on pavement parking that the DfT put out a while ago? I recall lots of comment about it but guess it's been held up by Covid. IIRC that was proposing to make pavement parking illegal, with a fixed penalty fine for transgressors. Obviously that's worked so well for mobile phone usage...
tu es Parisien et je réclame mes cinq euros
🙂
I can only speak for my own child’s school but getting there early doesn’t help at all.
You wait with your child until their class gets called in. If you park 10 mins away, obviously it adds 10 mins to the time you get into work.
Understood but this is surely only a thing for the youngest of kids, any older kids can walk to the playground themselves without parents.
left school in 1981. There were absolutely no kids getting dropped off in cars.
Yeah right! Plus, there was a resident peado on every street (don't go near No37!). So if one's school was say, a mile away, that means potentially getting nonced-up about ten times! And that's just on the way in! Plus having to dodge killer dogs and those glue-sniffing skinheads that threw your mate off a roof.
Well, no sign this afternoon, despite me still being f***ing sad and there still being no car on the drive. Maybe he was going to be more than 30 seconds. 🙂
The thought occurs, I've reported a few of the yellow line parkers through the council website in the past - never heard anything back (which is fair enough), but I realised this afternoon that there were definitely repeat offenders I no longer see offending. Snagged a couple more this afternoon, interested to see if reporting them stops it.
Yeah right! Plus, there was a resident peado on every street (don’t go near No37!). So if one’s school was say, a mile away, that means potentially getting nonced-up about ten times! And that’s just on the way in! Plus having to dodge killer dogs and those glue-sniffing skinheads that threw your mate off a roof.
Every street had at least one dog lazing about the pavement, and every so often you'd get packs of dogs chasing cars down streets. Every few streets had an aggressive (meaning noisy) dog to avoid.
A school friend used to get beaten up regularly for being really tall. And obnoxious.
Another school friend got stabbed in the belly after school when he was a teenager. No reason for it, but he'd occasionally show the scar.
And, not a schooldays story just a nod to weird times, a work colleague once told me about being beaten up, early 80s, by a bunch of teddy boys because he was wearing his motorbike leathers.
The thing about this I don't get, is that I live in a well-to-do place, where quite a lot of people are concerned about keeping up appearances. Yet it seems like all the social etiquette goes out of the window when cars are concerned.
You've gotta mind your Ps and Qs in the Co-op lest you be overheard discourteous, But you can park dangerously around school, posing a threat to children and pissing off neighbours -and no one seems to care.
<Walter Sobjek>"Has the whole world gone crazy? Am I the only one who cares about the rules?"</TBL>
Daughter gets a bus to school, but there's no bus home. 2 days week she walks the 2.5 miles home with a friend, as the route includes a stretch of muddy unlit footpath where kids seem to get followed, harassed and occasionally attacked maybe once or twice a year.
The days she can't walk home with a friend, one of us has to fetch her. We park 400 yards away from the carnage of parent parking to avoid any unseemly fist fights with fellow parents.
After today's terrible news about possible parking dispute leading to two people being murdered, be careful. Some crazy folk out there.
Not just schools, my mate owns this @51.0820788,-4.0583011,3a,75y,125.61h,83.45t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1smp3Utj5mSWnxp8hgQt75uQ!2e0!6shttps:%2F%2Fstreetviewpixels-pa.googleapis.com%2Fv1%2Fthumbnail%3Fpanoid%3Dmp3Utj5mSWnxp8hgQt75uQ%26cb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile.gps%26w%3D203%26h%3D100%26yaw%3D266.796%26pitch%3D0%26thumbfov%3D100!7i16384!8i8192!5m1!1e1">Garage
All was going well until the pizza place moved in next door.
Barely a day goes by without his entrance being blocked, he's had to put up extra signage, yellow crosshatching, phone calls to the police/council/Dominos
On Two for one pizza day the whole road is an utter no go between 5 & 7pm, pavements blocked both sides between the road junctions.
Yet drive 50 yards on & turn left - dozens of empty parking spaces.
A few years ago I had a colleague who lived opposite a school and every morning there was a FAM (Fat angry man) who parked either on his driver or over his drive blocking him in. Complaints to the FAM lead to abuse and threats to do his windows in.
Well one morning FAM found a car parked on the dropped kerb outside his own house blocking his car in completely. He called the police who told him to report it to the council, he called the council who sent out a parking warden who put a ticket on the car.
The next day the car was still there. And the following day, and the day after. The car didn't move for ten days and a new parking ticket was put on the car every day. FAM tried to move the car but the wheels seemed seized and the police told me if he damaged the car he would be guilty of criminal damage. The FAM sat watching the car everyday getting angrier and angrier getting ready to confront the person who had abandoned the car outside his house.
Then FAM got a letter from the DVLA. The letter was a new V5 for the car that was parked outside his house. Turns out he was the legal owner from about a fortnight earlier and he was liable for all the parking tickets.
Turns out "someone" had bought the car in his name (a complete banger worth about £10) and parked it outside his house.
Apparently FAM was very, very, very angry.
🙂
"Modern life in the UK is stressful. We’re under pressure to get to work and get our kids to school etc and there’s no provision for doing this sensibly, "
it really does not have to be like that - the stress and the difficulty is because of the choices you make.
"Car use and the perceived danger has increased a hundred fold since then."
Nonsense about car use. maybe percieved danger but real danger is less
the main reason for the car droppoff is the weird tory "choice" agenda for schools meaning for many its out of walking distance. We all used to go to the local school which was in walking distance
Then FAM got a letter from the DVLA. The letter was a new V5 for the car that was parked outside his house. Turns out he was the legal owner from about a fortnight earlier and he was liable for all the parking tickets.
That... That is one of the best stories I've ever heard. 😀
The FAM story is great. Please let it be true, not urban myth.