Pavement Parking

[reohn2]

Right now though, I have to succumb to the usefulness of the car... And the limitations of the green bin.

Mr Pickles, the scourge of sense, would love me. Grrr.

Especially when green's not you're colour

[Mick F]

The daughter of a friend of ours took a job up in Gloucester and moved up there. She had her own car and took it with her. She worked for BHS but all her colleagues were non-drivers from non-driving families. They have no need to drive living in Gloucester, and friend's daughter only used her car for going up and down the M5/A30 back to her mum and dad periodically.

What a wonderful idea. No cars.
It can only work in big towns and cities where you live and work within easy simple reach of public transport.

Yonks ago, there used to be large factories. The firm would run a works bus for the employees. These days, firms are smaller with fewer staff, and a works bus wouldn't be economic. Maybe some firms still run them, but there won't be many.

Nowadays, we have car sharing. I'm sure this works fine, and providing there's a carpark where the sharers can meet and leave one car behind, it'll be fine. Trouble is, more and more carparks are pay and display and limited to two or three hours. You need a long stay to be able to do this.

Gunnislake Station up the road from here ........... I've mentioned it before on here telling folk that they can park there and get the train to Plymouth to cross the channel for a cycle tour of Brittany, rather than pay the extortionate prices at the Plymouth ferry car park .................. the station car park is a meeting place for car-sharers. Free parking all day every day. We need more places like that.

Meanwhile, rural people need cars. Often two per household and sometimes three or more. It's the only way of existing, despite not having off-street parking. Ban on-street parking? Sorry, it can't work. It would be a vote loser.

Pavement parking is a totally different problem and should be stamped on hard.

[Bicycler]

Maybe if people working in towns lived in towns rather than rural villages then people working in rural occupations could afford to live in rural villages. I'm sorry but this living in the country commuting to the city trend of recent years is part of the problem not an argument against the solution.

[Mick F]

Yeah, maybe.
People in the countryside were not always working on farms. There used to be industrial work being done and those industries have gone even in my lifetime. Mining, for instance. Many of these mining villages are "rural" now but used to be industrial. Lake District, Peak District, rural Lancashire ..... and more.

I take your point though. If people lived where they worked, there would be less commuting traffic.

[AlaninWales]

Maybe if people working in towns lived in towns rather than rural villages then people working in rural occupations could afford to live in rural villages. I'm sorry but this living in the country commuting to the city trend of recent years is part of the problem not an argument against the solution.

Firstly, there frequently simply isn't the work locally they can do
Then where work exists, it is frequently casual, a day or two at a time and widely (tens of miles) separated. Also frequently 'bring your own tools'.
Given the lack of local work, people have for centuries gravitated towards towns for the employment they (used to) offer; this caused pressure for accomodation in towns, with resulting slums and worse.
Grouping workers together where they are conveniently placed for the employer is great - especially for the employer; for the workers, restrictions on how far away from home they can work cuts down the job oppportunities and therefore on their bargaining power. Of course back in the fourteenth century, laws tried to do exactly that. I don't think a return to such medieval employment laws would actually be a good thing for our society (although I wouldn't bet against it happening).

[Bicycler]

There's no forcing people to live anywhere. My point was that the situation which has evolved where people are willing to pay more to live in rural communities and drive vast distances to work is a product of motor car culture. Time and again I hear complaints of local people unable to buy houses in the local village because of the vastly inflated prices

[kwackers]

Firstly, there frequently simply isn't the work locally they can do
Then where work exists, it is frequently casual, a day or two at a time and widely (tens of miles) separated. Also frequently 'bring your own tools'.
Given the lack of local work, people have for centuries gravitated towards towns for the employment they (used to) offer; this caused pressure for accomodation in towns, with resulting slums and worse.
Grouping workers together where they are conveniently placed for the employer is great - especially for the employer; for the workers, restrictions on how far away from home they can work cuts down the job oppportunities and therefore on their bargaining power. Of course back in the fourteenth century, laws tried to do exactly that. I don't think a return to such medieval employment laws would actually be a good thing for our society (although I wouldn't bet against it happening).

That's why you have public transport. Public transport improved the lot of the prols for much of the 20th century, it was only when governments decided that cars were the future it all went pear shaped.
So no need to head back to medieval times, renationalise, spend some cash and everyone will benefit. Alternatively we can continue to rely on cars and simply put bets as to when the system will finally collapse under it's own weight.
IMO there's nothing wrong with encouraging people out of cars especially if it also gets them off the pavements.

[Cyril Haearn]

http://inhabitat.com/park-your-car-in-t ... by-a-tank/

[Pete Owens]

It is amazing the sense of entitlement that causes motorists to burst out wingeing (on a cycle forum of all places). The slightest restriction on their ability to park wherever and whenever they please or to drive at the speed of their choosing - whatever the inconvenience caused to anyone else, however much public space they consume - is treated as if it was a complete ban on car use anywhere and everywhere.

Lets get this straight - driving is a luxury not a necessity of life - and an option that is only available to a minority of the population. Of course if you do have a car and are able to drive this does open up the possiblity of choosing to live in inaccesible places and work, shop etc miles and miles away. If people choose a hyper-mobile lifestyle then they have chosen to make themselves car-dependent.

These people would find it tricky of cars were banned overnight - but they would adjust. Even so we are still talking about a very small proportion of the population. The vast majority of existing car journeys are very short.

[MartinC]

...........................Alternatively we can continue to rely on cars and simply put bets as to when the system will finally collapse under it's own weight.............................

Yes, people running out of space to store them is just one sympton. What will we do when the pavements are full?

[squeaker]

...........................Alternatively we can continue to rely on cars and simply put bets as to when the system will finally collapse under it's own weight.............................

Which apparently is what the footways do in some of our older town centres (think cellars...) when delivery truck drivers pavement park

[MikeF]

...........................Alternatively we can continue to rely on cars and simply put bets as to when the system will finally collapse under it's own weight.............................

Yes, people running out of space to store them is just one sympton. What will we do when the pavements are full?

On some roads around here it's nearly that now. On one road today, admittedly a no through road for vehicles, but not for pedestrians, the only place to walk was the road itself! Vehicles occupied the whole width of the pavement, the drivers presumably thinking (wrongly) that if they parked on the pavement side of the double yellow lines it was OK!
Vehicles can now use the hard shoulder of some motorways, so why not pavements as well.

[carsickglasgow]

In Scotland there was going to be a Bill to formally ban pavement parking, but they recently decided it's not within the legislative competence of the Parliament so it's probably not going to happen. Sad. It's a rampant problem.

[John Holiday]

As an extension of the above discussion & the effect of indiscriminate/inconsiderate parking, I am amazed that the local bus operator (Arriva) does not object to parked vehicles on their routes in the Chester/North Wales area.
In several locations on the run into Chester, the roads are narrow & often residential streets, but the parked cars cause serious difficulty for the bus drivers.
This is particularly so on narrow sreets with a row of a dozen cars parked. If the bus pulls out into the oncoming traffic, he is almost bound to meet another vehicle with the inevitable problem.
All because people think they have a right to park on the road outside their property!

[thirdcrank]

As an extension of the above discussion & the effect of indiscriminate/inconsiderate parking, I am amazed that the local bus operator (Arriva) does not object to parked vehicles on their routes in the Chester/North Wales area.
In several locations on the run into Chester, the roads are narrow & often residential streets, but the parked cars cause serious difficulty for the bus drivers.
This is particularly so on narrow sreets with a row of a dozen cars parked. If the bus pulls out into the oncoming traffic, he is almost bound to meet another vehicle with the inevitable problem.
All because people think they have a right to park on the road outside their property!

Perhaps the bus operator does object and is largely ignored. As I've posted many times before, there's little that's more likely to cause a white funk in local councillors than residents upset about their parking. In the absence of anything else, the relevant Secretary of State has decided that there's electoral advantage in being seen as the champion of the parking motorist and he's been sitting on local authorities to reduce parking bans and enforcement.