Happy New Year from Barnet Council

Mr Mustard reads random decisions on the parking PCN tribunal website. When he saw one was for 1 January 24 he took a look.

 

This is the road in question

As it is within a controlled parking zone, for which you pass zone entry signs as you exit the A5, the single yellow sign is 400m away around a corner and the hours are 9:30am to 4:30pm on Mondays to Saturdays (including bank holidays).

 

Thus the single yellow was in force but Mr Mustard suspects that many motorists wouldn't understand (time to learn which you are doing now).

 

What the adjudicator could have allowed on, if the motorist had raised it as an argument, is that because of the obvious inference that it is ok to park outside of the zig zag hours, is that the single yellow should have its own sign in accordance with guidance.

The role of the adjudicator is to decide upon the arguments placed in front of them although they will sometimes pick up council errors of their own volition.

 

That is the reason why every motorist should learn all they can about PCNs as with Mr Mustard's help this PCN might have been defeated.

 

Mr Mustard decided to ask Barnet Council a few questions about PCNs issued on 1 January as it isn't a day when there is likely to be much requirement for traffic management, with many motorists beached on the sofa watching the TV, and so he expected numbers to be lower (spoiler alert, they weren't).

Here are the questions and the response:

Mr Mustard was grateful for the hint that the Open Data portal had been brought up to date as it had not been updated for years (the income part is still two years behind).

Mr Mustard then extracted the data for himself, and broke it down by contravention type:

What we see is that for traffic wardens, 1 January is just another day, they can fill their non-existent quota of tickets (giving out zero PCNs during an 8 hour shift would probably lead to the sack after a difficult conversation with your supervisor) by focussing on specific contraventions.

In order to make up for not being able to issue PCNs to cars parked in residents bays and pay to park locations the daily amount of PCNs is made up by people making innocent errors on single yellow lines on a day when it doesn't really matter. You know what to do on bank holidays, park in residents and pay-to-park bays and car parks.

The end.

Will Newham Council relent on this PCN?

Here is the road in which the offending car was parked, probably on a double yellow (Mr Mustard didn't act as representative so doesn't have any photos), but don't judge the driver on that sentence alone.

This road is a parking design nightmare with every man (or woman) for themself and no chance of anyone having a nice green frontage as if you do that there is simply nowhere you can park.

Here is the tribunal adjudication decision, the contravention did occur so the PCN had to be upheld. Towing was a step too far though. The adjudicator did the best he could within the law.

What a day Mr Syed Naqvi had, a 12 hour shift on Xmas Day and a return journey to Hastings. The parking department should be awarding him the freedom of the borough, not taking his car away.

Newham's bank holiday policy is too harsh.

Mr Mustard wondered what the parking department would do in response to the nudge from the Adjudicator, would they decide to keep the money that had to be paid before the car would be released from the pound or would they decide to refund it? Mr Mustard decided on a bit of nudging himself, he emailed the Mayor of Newham. If he gets a reply he will let you know.

If you happen to know Mr Syed Naqvi of Croombs Road in Newham do please thank him for his dedication.

End

School keep clear - out of term time enforcement

In 2014 new map based Traffic Management Orders ('TMO') which established the parking restrictions were introduced which replaced the former schedule based ones seemingly without changes to the rules, but was that true?

This is from the new TMO:

Mr Mustard happens to be fighting a PCN given out on the school keep clear markings (the yellow zig zags) on 6 January 2020 which was an inset day, in Goodwyn Avenue, the location of St Martin's School. There were no children in school that day so effectively term started on 7 January 2020. The entire keep clear marking was parked up and after being politely challenged the traffic warden, having issued a PCN to one car and taken advice from a more senior colleague by radio, walked on and left all the other cars alone. Barnet Council still want their penalty of £110 paid though (rather oddly it would have been £130 if done by cctv, a matter which Mr Mustard will consider on another day).

Mr Mustard found the original TMO from 1996. It said that the school keep clear markings are only enforced during term times (hard to put on the signs as actual dates would be needed)

The replacement TMO says this:

Thus the rules apply every Monday - Friday regardless of whether the school is in term or outside of it. Whilst the traffic wardens walked past schools without issuing PCns from 1 to 5 January 2020 (they may have not been working on 1 January) the remote enforcement by camera continued as normal on those days as if there was some traffic management problem to solve or a bank account to fill. Mr Mustard thinks that the general mood of the public is that enforcing outside schools on New Year's Day is profoundly unfair.

At East Barnet School (to take a random example) term started on 6 January so were any PCNs issued by camera in 2020 before that date? Oh yes, three of them, which got 2020 off to a bad start for three people and will have sullied their view of Barnet Council and rightly so.

Mr Mustard then thought to check something, the council's website on which a lot of people, including Mr Mustard, rely to check the rules of bank holiday enforcement.

There are therefore two examples of how Barnet Council say one thing and do something different. They changed the TMO from term time to all year without advertising the fact and secondly they say they won't enforce school keep clear markings on bank holidays (when schools as well as banks are closed) but they are sending out PCNs by post (traffic wardens generally walk past closed schools so it is only the schools with cameras which get enforced).

Was the issue of PCNs on New Year's Day a one off error? No!

Mr Mustard will be writing to the parking manager asking him to refund those bank holiday school keep clear PCNs. What do you want to bet that the answer will be a polite no thank you?

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard

Bank Holiday parking enforcement

Even Mr Mustard was confused by the guidance on the Barnet Council website about Bank Holiday enforcement and so he suggested a simple solution which was to put up a list of contravention types and whether they are enforced or not on Bank Holidays. The council have listened as they know that what Mr Mustard says often makes sense.

Should that be "Residents' bays" or to avoid the apostrophe problem, "Bays for residents".

Please don't block the dropped kerb of someone you don't know on a Bank Holiday or block a cycle lane or make it hard for the blind or people pushing a wheelchair or a pram to use the pavement.

Double parking is defined by the whole of your car being more than 50cm from the kerb.

You don't have to go to a shopping centre on Monday, you can go to one of our many High Streets and park for free. Yippee. Help keep trade local.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard

Yellow Fever - a Bank Holiday outbreak

A pickup called Yellow Fever

Single yellow lines are very popular places for traffic wardens to scoot along to on Bank Holidays. After all, CPZ bays are free and they have to get their denied quota from somewhere, no good going back to the office and saying there wasn't a single car wrongly parked.

Mr Mustard is indebted to Declan Hoare, the Assistant Director of Highways and Transport, for rapidly providing the info about yellow lines that he was seeking (tongue lashing on another matter to follow quite soon though!) and here it is, an explanation about the enforcement of single yellow lines on a Bank Holiday (remember, never park on double yellow lines, simples - blue badge holders might be able to but more of that on another day)

First, what Mr Mustard asked:

Dear Mr Hoare

I have thought for some time that the website which sets out the details of parking enforcement on Bank Holidays would benefit from some simplification and added clarity.

What I would suggest as a layout that would leave no room for confusion is to present the information in 2 columns, the first of which sets out the items which will be enforced and the second one sets out those that won't be enforced. Thus the motorist can easily check the position. Do you agree?

I have a question about the enforcement of single yellow lines. These are enforced but residents and dual use and pay by phone bays aren't which rather implies that a single yellow line inside of a cpz should not be enforced either. Is that the case or would a ticket be given to a motorist on a single yellow line inside a cpz during the zone hours. This question is a general one and does not relate to any particular PCN.

Yours sincerely 

Mr Mustard

and then the response

Dear Mr Mustard

Our communications team are currently reviewing all our parking web content to make it more helpful to the public. I have therefore copied this email to Chris Palmer (aka the "Tooting Twister") so that your helpful comments on how to explain bank holiday enforcement can be considered.

In respect to your other query I can confirm that single yellow lines are enforced whether in a CPZ or not. Whilst residents bays, dual and pay by phone bays are not enforced yellow lines are enforced. This is to ensure that the public do not get confused about yellow line enforcement. As we both know most members of the public are not aware about whether a particular yellow line sits inside or outside a CPZ and therefore not enforcing yellow lines solely within CPZs was considered to be unfair to motorists who might believe all yellow lines to be unenforced on bank holidays. Enforcing all yellow lines prevents that confusion. Therefore I can confirm that a ticket would be given to a motorist on a single yellow line inside a CPZ during the zone hours.

Declan Hoare

Mr Mustard disagrees with Mr Hoare that this will stop the public being confused about yellow lines. It might if there was a clear statement to that effect on the council website but there isn't.

Mr Mustard can see the thinking behind the council's argument but it is a flawed one. Most people think that the large CPZ time signs at the entrances to a zone tell you all you need to know but they don't. They tell you the hours of single yellow lines (unless marked with other times) and of marked out bays which don't have a time plate. Now given that inside a CPZ that you can park for free in a residents bay, a pay-by-phone bay or dual use bay on a Bank Holiday then it is an easy step from there to thinking that the single yellow line inside a CPZ will also be off. That is a mistake that will cost you £110 (or £55 if the parking ticket is still on your windscreen when you reach your car, many are going missing, that will be the subject of another blog). 

The question is why anything except double yellows, parking on junctions and being an obstruction (the police may deal with this) i.e. dangerous parking, are not the only thing that are being enforced on a Bank Holiday. There is much less traffic on the road. The thing to do is to write to your local ward councillors and ask them to get the council to stop enforcing on a Bank Holiday. You can find their details here.

Our quality of life should come before revenue raising on a Bank Holiday.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard