This little rant was sent to us by Robert Kyle, and sparked a small gleam of sympathy in the depths of our frustrated soul ...
I own a car.
I really do. It’s an older car but it’s still got all four wheels, an engine and some seats, not to mention the fact that the paintwork is intact and regularly cleaned and a loving dose of polish or wax spread over its delightful bodywork. I also try very hard to ensure that the better half doesn’t turn it into a garbage drop-off centre by regularly and thoroughly emptying the interior space, hoovering it and wiping down the dash and leather seats. I keep on top of all the maintenance myself having been gifted at a young age with the ability to read a maintenance guide book and being able to actually do what is both illustrated and written in the holy pages.
I drive this vehicle on the most gloriously under-repaired road network in the third world, Great Britain. I generally avoid speed cameras thanks to an extreme feat of engineering commonly referred to as satellite navigation with built-in safety camera ‘slam on the brakes’ alerting technology. I do on occasion fall foul of the over-zealous state and waste, on average, twenty minutes of my precious life talking with a couple of idiots in a fancy car with blue lights, about the cataclysmic death possibilities of doing 80mph on a 70mph limited (?) empty motorway at four in the morning …
I take pride in my driving, sometimes. I hold more than one licence - got the motorcycle one for when two wheels come calling, and the car one for when I want to drive a tractor or play at being a white van man.
There are occasions when I don’t drive. These occasions are limited to either being in bed, working or visiting the overpriced local global-investor-owned convenience store for some packaged energy providers and 10 gallons of milk for the price of a small bungalow. Other than that I generally don’t stop the vehicle unless blue lights or red ones tell me to.
I would really like to stop more often. My back aches and I need to stretch my legs now and again and I really want to do my bit for the crazy piece of the economy that seems to rule supreme: in other words I want to go shopping!
Not just any shopping. I want to go to my local city centre, in which vicinity stopping costs an arm, a leg and a kidney, which no doubt funds extravagant lunches and trips to first world countries for the councillors lucky enough to lie through their teeth without being caught out, and so elected to represent themselves on our behalf. The city centre is a strange place, no doubt, and full of glorious places which one can only dream of. I wouldn’t know, as I’ve not been there in years, but I have caught sight in passing of some of the joys of which I am being cheated. It’s only ten minutes from my house to the absolute centre of the city for crying out loud!
So why don't I go?
Well, there are a few problems, and the main one is parking the bloody car. Generally (and I know it’s possible as I did something similar in my driving test) it’s a case of finding a space and sneakily indicating your intentions by way of an indicator stalk and some flashing amber lights before engaging a gear (normally reverse) and swinging the steering wheel around until somehow you wedge your vehicle in between two other vehicles without colliding and of course keeping within the parking etiquette which kind of dictates that the vehicles should form a line within close proximity to the pavement. I can do this. I am sure you can too.
Where everything seems to go wrong is in the initial stages of finding a parking space! It’s not for lack of space as my local city centre, being Glasgow, is a bomb site of neglect and mismanagement that has fallen into such a state of disrepair that I really am not sure when turning a corner whether I may stumble upon some Afghan soldiers hunting the Taliban or whether there might be a tree growing in the middle of the road which will force me into ‘avoidance mode’, which generally means mounting what’s left of the pedestrian pavement and trying to then avoid a strategically placed planter in full flower with cigarette butts, smashed beer bottles and syringes. Businesses with any sense have long since left this barren wasteland in search of a retail park providing respite from beggars and ample room in which to place beautifully crafted and free parking spaces for visitors. The city centre has taken a massive hit and unless you have a drug problem or fancy getting stabbed on a night out you simply don’t go there, meaning that parking spaces should be easily found and plentiful.
But they’re not.
You see, within all this tribal stabbing and over-enthusiasm for anything that wastes the mind, there is a mafia racket going down and it’s not just limited to the city centre. This controlling group are country wide and never repent the misery they bring to peoples' lives. They are not happy that you’ve sacrificed everything you have in order to put some fuel in your car's tank and some vehicle excise duty on the window. No, they want their share - they've earned it simply by calling themselves an official name and generating computer-printed pieces of paper. They are the local council. They’ve hired a hit squad of monkeys and armed them with metal signs and paint brushes. These very idiots run riot round every town and city in the country and vandalise the streets with yellow lines and obscure signs dictating where you can park, how long you can park and most importantly, what their cut is.
The courts used to be full of people arguing about parking tickets and this took time and effort. No doubt having lawyers and judges arguing and debating the finer points of yellow line transgression was seen as limiting the profitability of the extortion racket. Also it might have prevented actual criminals being prosecuted, so in order to clear the mess up it was decided to ‘de-criminalise’ parking. This freed up Police Officers to spend time eating doughnuts and focus on real crimes such as ... er ... ok, just ‘crimes’, whatever the politicians decide they are this week. Possibly looking at your neighbour for more than 5 seconds a day?
So in came the lower arm of the mafia team, the traffic wardens, who beat the streets and dish out the demands for their masters. These people are generally either not intelligent enough to get a proper job or had a job and suffered an illness that somehow warped their brains and made them view being a traffic warden as a powerful and fulfilling job that benefits society. Problem is that with any sub-standard breed of life which lacks basic morals and judgement, handing them power and control goes straight to their head and they believe they are gods. Look at New Labour if you doubt this …
So these little warriors of the state walk around attaching pieces of paper to windscreens making demands for payment for a range of what they term ‘offences’. These offences don’t actually have to be offensive in any manner like, for example, parking your car in the middle of a traffic junction and so causing grief for fellow road users. Nope, these offences could be daring not to PAY for a ticket from one of their little money-generating machines or parking on a yellow line – you know, the kind that isn’t there due to cuts in painting budgets, but was at some point and there is a sign somewhere on the street stating something or another but can’t really be read as a hedge grew in front of it or someone’s nicked it for scrap metal.
These little saviours of mankind don’t care for signs or lines or rules. They are so utterly untouchable that they can literally put a piece of paper on your window and then have your bank accounts frozen and the money put into their masters' even if you haven’t committed any offences at all and in some cases even if you weren’t there. If you feel that you have been wronged then you can appeal to them to have the ticket dropped, which generally results in a letter saying “Give us your money”. If you’re still not happy then you can appeal to another government department which is apparently independent (about as independent as the Police run Independent Police Complaints Commission!) which will look at your case and more likely than not have it thrown out in your favour, strangely, either due to finding the council completely incompetent (which isn’t particularly hard) or by finding you innocent by virtue of the fact you were in Thailand smoking pot at the time of the transgression.
The people at the councils say that they need to generate income from parking in order to maintain public services at some level or another, provide jobs and manage traffic issues. I personally say, pay off the idiotic traffic wardens and provide free parking in the city centres. Have cars parked everywhere, so shoppers can happily spend hours and £s in all the shops, thus generating tax incomes through business rates and all the other taxes. As the people return to the city centre so will business and investment. We can pull out the soldiers, turn the tree into a tourist attraction and have people gainfully employed serving other people and providing a valued service rather than a self-serving gangster extortion racket.
How would we achieve this monumental transformation? We can’t, as we’re all too busy watching nonsense on the TV and dreaming of winning the lottery and escaping this hell hole of a country. We have the power to change things, but we’d prefer to use it to run our Playstations so we can shoot foreigners online and indulge in complete self-gratification while the councils and governments utterly and totally destroy our country and our future generations' freedoms and enjoyment. We’re currently experiencing one of the biggest global messes for generations, and it is all due to over-tweaking the control mechanisms and ripping the souls out of the working bees (us) to such an extent that we no longer give a toss about the values of humanity. We really do have an opportunity to change things: let us start with the simple stuff that doesn’t affect anybody or cause harm and could only be good for the population. Let us go forth and restore free parking. Let us criminalise clearly dangerous and inconsiderate parking and give the Police something to do other than prosecute people for looking at the lovely blonde next door. Let’s return value to our undervalued country and resurrect ‘soul’ for our desperate selves. It’s not hard and not unachievable.
The GOS says: Robert is right. I have seen free parking in action, and it works.
I haven't been to Paris for the last fifteen years or so, but when I did I can tell you that motorists parked anywhere they damn well liked, including on zebra crossings, on the pavement, in between the bollards erected to stop them parking on the pavement, even between the bollards and the wall in a space so tight you couldn't understand how they got there at all. I once sat in a pavement café and watched an elderly gentleman who had got boxed in by other cars. He slipped his Mercedes into gear and gently nudged the car in front. Then he selected reverse and did the same to the car behind. Three or four nudges later he was free, and no damage had been done because his Mercedes (like my own much lamented 190E) had nice squashy plastic bumpers.
And you know what? It worked. The traffic was slow and chaotic (except on the dreaded Périphérique where it was suicidally fast and chaotic) but it kept moving. Drivers who ought by rights to have been on the Metro did nevertheless complete their lunatic journeys and found somewhere to leave the car when they got there, even if it was the main entrance of a maternity hospital or a fire station. If they couldn't, they just double parked.
Very pragmatic race, the French. We could learn a lot from them; for instance, who are roads for? Traffic wardens or road users?
P.S. Here's an idea: let's start with hospital carparks. After all, we paid for them. Why shouldn't we park in them?
either on this site or on the World Wide Web.
Copyright © 2011 The GOS