Cycling UK Forum

reohn2 wrote:

drossall wrote:Good in principle. However, knowing the area, it would be overkill I think for the rather small situation, in limited road space, that triggered the original post. That just needs give and take all round.

Quite!
If a scaffold Lorry needs to unload and erect scaffold on site it can be there for upto an hour or morewhilst tube,fitting and boards are unloaded as the structure is erected,a "please use other footpath" sign would be better for pedestrians safety if the lorry is parked on the footpath.
Traffic needs to sort itself out for the short time there is restricted or narrow lanes.
As for authorisartion for such short delays IMO it isn't necessary if as you say a little give and take is used.

A little give and take? Usually all give is demanded from those cycling and walking - it's all take by the motorists!

Parking on the footway is an offence in London, as well as driving on the footway being an offence like elsewhere. There's a process to authorise it, but no evidence that it was used in the OP's case.

Ironically, that means that the proper method would have been to park entirely on the carriageway, blocking the cycle lane and then some, but I suspect the proximity of the junction would have resulted in traffic police attendance and regulation of the unloading to be done in a timely manner, which I suspect is what I suspect the driver was seeking to avoid by parking in a manner that seems not to be a priority any more.

mjr wrote:
Parking on the footway is an offence in London, as well as driving on the footway being an offence like elsewhere. There's a process to authorise it, but no evidence that it was used in the OP's case.

Ironically, that means that the proper method would have been to park entirely on the carriageway, blocking the cycle lane and then some, but I suspect the proximity of the junction would have resulted in traffic police attendance and regulation of the unloading to be done in a timely manner, which I suspect is what I suspect the driver was seeking to avoid by parking in a manner that seems not to be a priority any more.

Not in this case. The act which makes it illegal has quite a few exceptions. Sub section viii allows the parking of vehicles on the path when work is being carried out on adjacent premises.

(7)(a)Nothing in this section shall make it unlawful under subsection (1) of this section to park a vehicle of any of the following descriptions, that is to say:—

(i)vehicles used for fire brigade purposes [F12or for purposes relating to the functions of Ministry of Defence fire-fighters (as defined in section 16 of the Armed Forces Act 2016)];
(ii)vehicles used for police purposes;
(iii)vehicles used for ambulance purposes;
(iv)street cleansing purposes;
(v)vehicles used for the collection of refuse;
(vi)vehicles used for the purpose of gritting or salting or the clearance of snow;
(vii)vehicles used for the purpose of cleansing, repairing or maintaining lighting apparatus;
(viii)vehicles used in connection with the reconstruction, alteration or maintenance of, or the provision of services to, a road, or of or to any premises adjoining a road;
(ix)vehicles used in connection with the placing, inspecting, maintaining, adjusting, repairing, altering, renewing or removing of apparatus or accommodation therefor in, under or over a road;
(x)any vehicle not falling within sub-paragraph (viii) or (ix) of this paragraph used by statutory undertakers in pursuance of their statutory powers or duties provided that is reasonably necessary for the vehicle to be so parked;
(xi)vehicles of any class for the time being specified by resolution of the Council for the purposes of this subsection;
(xii)any vehicle, specified by the highway authority from time to time for the purposes of this subsection, which is parked at such place and at such time as may be authorised by that highway authority.

pete75 wrote:Not in this case. The act which makes it illegal has quite a few exceptions. Sub section viii allows the parking of vehicles on the path when work is being carried out on adjacent premises.

I thought the work in the OP was being carried out on a building site around the corner and the cycle lane and footway were being obstructed as a softer option than getting the correct permits for unloading on the red route (and so having to comply with time restrictions and other requirements).

mjr wrote:

pete75 wrote:Not in this case. The act which makes it illegal has quite a few exceptions. Sub section viii allows the parking of vehicles on the path when work is being carried out on adjacent premises.

I thought the work in the OP was being carried out on a building site around the corner and the cycle lane and footway were being obstructed as a softer option than getting the correct permits for unloading on the red route (and so having to comply with time restrictions and other requirements).

If he does say it was round the corner I must have missed that bit. The exception actually says "any premises adjoining a road" so if they are working on stuff round teh corner on somewhere adjoining a road then presumably it's ok. I'd have thought the highway authorities would prefer a vehicle parked there rather than on the red route which is obviously made one because they don't want it obstructed.

mjr wrote:A little give and take? Usually all give is demanded from those cycling and walking - it's all take by the motorists!

Parking on the footway is an offence in London, as well as driving on the footway being an offence like elsewhere. There's a process to authorise it, but no evidence that it was used in the OP's case.

Ironically, that means that the proper method would have been to park entirely on the carriageway, blocking the cycle lane and then some, but I suspect the proximity of the junction would have resulted in traffic police attendance and regulation of the unloading to be done in a timely manner, which I suspect is what I suspect the driver was seeking to avoid by parking in a manner that seems not to be a priority any more.

You suspect an aweful lot without a shread of evidence to support it.

Lance Dopestrong wrote:[quote"]
To avoid following the correct and lawful procedures is not a noble thing, and is morally and legally unjustifiable. People do what they do in these circumstances because they can't be arrissed, and they're very unlikely to suffer any adverse consequences, and that's the bottom line. Having done so they then make up weak excuses for their actions, instead of simply being honest.

[/quote]

Hopefully then you will never need a home visit from a GP, Community Nurse, or Carers. You may have convenient parking by your home, but it's highly probably that several of the 5-10 preceding visits will have needed two trips round the block followed by 30 minutes of walking to and from the patients address from the legal parking space. They will be running extremely late by the time they get to you.

Don't even get me started on Companies that build Retirement Flats then actively prevent Health Care workers from using the Car Park.

Think of a simple and common scenario. The delivery van delivering something heavy and bulky, such as a settee, on a road that is busy and is a bus route. One side of the road has a line of legally parked vehicles, with no spaces left for a large van, and the other side has double yellow lines and a wide pavement. You can legally stop for (i think) twenty minutes on double yellows with no kerb markings if you are delivering, so no problem there, but doing so would block traffic flow, including buses. What do you do? Go to the Highways Authority and request an official road closure? No, you put two wheels on the pavement if that will allow a bus to pass. Without blocking the pavement. That is the real world. It's not ideal but nothing is.

The puritans will throw their hands up in horror but until they come up with an alternative that works for busy people they have nothing better to suggest.

TBH, I'd rather people use delivery vehicles which occasionally have to deal with that sort of situation than drive themselves. The more people do that, the more likely there will be suitable parking for the delivery van.

That said, IMO, as said above, the root cause is crap design that allows a street to be so narrowed by parking that a delivery driver is forced to that sort of choice.

pwa wrote:.....The puritans will throw their hands up in horror but until they come up with an alternative that works for busy people they have nothing better to suggest.

And that is the top and bottom of it.
But then the sensible amongst us already knew that.

pete75 wrote:Signs put up saying a road is closed are very often lying. It's rare for a bridge to be up or a trench right across the road which actually do close a road. Usually all that's preventing the use of the road are cones or even nothing more than road closed signs.

I read that as saying it's OK to ride through coned off areas on a bike. If you can see the road has no blockages is it still OK to to ride or walk your bike through coned areas?

Round here you see short sections of roads around building sites coned off with lights and cyclists often just carrying on through against the red light because they're riding inside the coned off area. That is something I dislike and never do on my bike. The closest I've come to that was when I wheeled my bike through on the pedestrian way through the cones.

Anyway, I'm sure you're not advocating ignoring coned off areas of roadworks just ones you know are obsolete but never been reopened.

pwa wrote:What do you do? Go to the Highways Authority and request an official road closure? No, you put two wheels on the pavement if that will allow a bus to pass. Without blocking the pavement. That is the real world. It's not ideal but nothing is.

The puritans will throw their hands up in horror but until they come up with an alternative that works for busy people they have nothing better to suggest.

That reads like an Aunt Sally combined with a false dichotomy. The obvious answer is to go to the Highways Authority and do whatever they ask as conditions for a works permit. But I do realise the current shambolic state of "the real world" is that Broken Britain has a load of fly-by-night cowboys granting themselves "permission", obstructing active travel, endangering people and sometimes threatening those who dare express dissatisfaction with their cheapskate corner-cutting, while apologists defend them all over the internet.

mjr wrote:

pwa wrote:What do you do? Go to the Highways Authority and request an official road closure? No, you put two wheels on the pavement if that will allow a bus to pass. Without blocking the pavement. That is the real world. It's not ideal but nothing is.

The puritans will throw their hands up in horror but until they come up with an alternative that works for busy people they have nothing better to suggest.

That reads like an Aunt Sally combined with a false dichotomy. The obvious answer is to go to the Highways Authority and do whatever they ask as conditions for a works permit. But I do realise the current shambolic state of "the real world" is that Broken Britain has a load of fly-by-night cowboys granting themselves "permission", obstructing active travel, endangering people and sometimes threatening those who dare express dissatisfaction with their cheapskate corner-cutting, while apologists defend them all over the internet.

I suspect that a pair of delivery personnel loading up with furniture to deliver to half a dozen addresses they have never been to before may not have all the permits you would like, and may just have to make the best of the situations they find on the ground as they travel around their route for the day. Do you think it is practical for them to do a site visit to each address prior to arrival and apply for permits where required? I think that is unrealistic.

mjr wrote:That reads like an Aunt Sally combined with a false dichotomy. The obvious answer is to go to the Highways Authority and do whatever they ask as conditions for a works permit. But I do realise the current shambolic state of "the real world" is that Broken Britain has a load of fly-by-night cowboys granting themselves "permission", obstructing active travel, endangering people and sometimes threatening those who dare express dissatisfaction with their cheapskate corner-cutting, while apologists defend them all over the internet.

Whilst I agree to some extent with both perspectives, here, I still think that the blame needs to be laid on the poor design of infrastructure, rather than 'cowboys', or regulations that recognise the problems with infrastructure.

For one thing, some councils actually encourage pavement parking, by marking parking spaces over the kerb. For example https://www.google.com/maps/@51.7343207 ... 312!8i6656

Secondly, very many streets that permit on-street parking should not, because they are too narrow. IMO, the example lined above should have parking on one side only. I think it's already residential permit parking.

Lastly, there is much less hazard in stationary vehicles than moving ones. People carrying out legitimate business, such as delivering groceries on a residential street are typically no more an obstruction than a cyclist is.

pwa wrote:

mjr wrote:That reads like an Aunt Sally combined with a false dichotomy. The obvious answer is to go to the Highways Authority and do whatever they ask as conditions for a works permit. But I do realise the current shambolic state of "the real world" is that Broken Britain has a load of fly-by-night cowboys granting themselves "permission", obstructing active travel, endangering people and sometimes threatening those who dare express dissatisfaction with their cheapskate corner-cutting, while apologists defend them all over the internet.

I suspect that a pair of delivery personnel loading up with furniture to deliver to half a dozen addresses they have never been to before may not have all the permits you would like, [...]

They should load up in some sort of purpose-built off-road loading bay because that's not going to be an occasional occurence.

pwa wrote:Do you think it is practical for them to do a site visit to each address prior to arrival and apply for permits where required? I think that is unrealistic.

No, it should be for the buyer to ensure a suitable unloading space is available and the deliverers to refuse if it is not. I am sure that our last two pieces of furniture delivered included warnings in the terms of sale that we were responsible for this and the delivery fee would be charged again if they had to come back.

mjr wrote:

pwa wrote:

mjr wrote:That reads like an Aunt Sally combined with a false dichotomy. The obvious answer is to go to the Highways Authority and do whatever they ask as conditions for a works permit. But I do realise the current shambolic state of "the real world" is that Broken Britain has a load of fly-by-night cowboys granting themselves "permission", obstructing active travel, endangering people and sometimes threatening those who dare express dissatisfaction with their cheapskate corner-cutting, while apologists defend them all over the internet.

I suspect that a pair of delivery personnel loading up with furniture to deliver to half a dozen addresses they have never been to before may not have all the permits you would like, [...]

They should load up in some sort of purpose-built off-road loading bay because that's not going to be an occasional occurence.

pwa wrote:Do you think it is practical for them to do a site visit to each address prior to arrival and apply for permits where required? I think that is unrealistic.

No, it should be for the buyer to ensure a suitable unloading space is available and the deliverers to refuse if it is not. I am sure that our last two pieces of furniture delivered included warnings in the terms of sale that we were responsible for this and the delivery fee would be charged again if they had to come back.

Lots of streets would never get any deliveries if that were applied rigorously. People would just have to get used to life without furniture.