Rotten eggs in Newham

 

A strange case which Mr Mustard stumbled upon.

 

This is a really strange PCN given that the location does not exist and Mr Mustard thought that all of the locations within a borough are pre-loaded into the equipment used by 'traffic wardens'.

Cannon Cars don't appear for any other case in the register of PCNs taken to the tribunal so are not habitual offenders.

How Newham Council thought they would win at the tribunal given that the address could not be substantiated will probably have to remain a mystery. The first duty on a council at the tribunal is to prove their case which was clearly impossible.

The end.

Stop the rot

Mr Mustard expects that most drivers/residents will know the Golders Green station area as will many coach travellers as it is a stop on some long distance National Express journeys (e.g. Manchester to London). Here is an aerial view

Mr Mustard didn't realise when he snipped the image but there is a handily placed bus to demonstrate bus scale, Mr Mustard having drawn a line to show a gap of 10.9m into which a bus is meant to fit at the lights if going south down the Finchley Road and navigating around the island with the clock on it.

Why is Mr Mustard writing about this subject? It is because of this tribunal decision.

Mr Mustard looked up the coach in question to find it is a Mercedes Benz Tourismo and longer than the gap between the traffic lights and the yellow box it was going over.

Thus, as Mr Thacker said, it is impossible to not overhang the yellow box.

As the adjudicator pointed out the stop was due to red traffic lights not due to a stationary vehicle so absolutely no contravention had occurred and this behaviour is, in the words of regular reader Fraser 'ruthless, venal and rapacious' and Mr Mustard would add stupid and procedurally unfair.

It is hard enough to safely drive a coach through London especially around busy junctions without having to worry if you might get wrongly ticketed by some numpty at NSL who doesn't know the rules and thinks that because the computer controlled cctv has selected this as a possible contravention, that it must be so. In fact, two people are meant to watch the cctv extracts before pressing the PCN button but Mr Mustard suspects that the task is either not being performed or not diligently or with any real thought.

Mr Mustard is going to send this case to the relevant labour councillor who can start to bring some common sense and some law abiding behaviour to the parking / PCN department.

The end (or at least perhaps the beginning of it for revenue raising).
 

Coach driver #2 - needs coaching

Just like buses Mr Mustard found reports of a second coach related PCN right behind the first one. Here is the adjudicator's (correct) decision:

The children at this school are aged up to 11 hence the wish for the coach to be as near as possible to the entrance although it has no chance of getting all the way along Richmond Rd which is tight to navigate even in a large car.

One solution to the problem is to park the coach in Gloucester Rd but the kids would have to be supervised crossing the busy road or, cynically, to add a £65 'parking charge' to the quote for transport to cover the cost of the PCN and just pay it on arrival.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard

Back to school for teacher

This adjudication decision caught Mr Mustard's eye

Mr Mustard popped down to Southover to have a look.

Clearly the coach cannot turn around in the cul-de-sac section

What were the alternatives?

1. Stop short of the zig zags which would mean the road was blocked and the passengers could disembark in complete safety as traffic could not pass. It should only take 2 or 3 minutes.

2. Drop the kids off in the side road, Arlington, and use the side gate? (it may be parked up during term time?)

Other thoughts:

The council have partly caused the problem by installing two sets of keep clear markings adjacent to each other with a small gap. The maximum length of school keep clear markings is 43.560 metres and the use of two sets is not really on.

If the council hadn't installed the second set there would have been room for the coach to stop. It isn't as if the second set are there to protect the kids as although they do cover an entrance it isn't there for children to access the school but for the benefit of the teachers' car park. More thought really needs to go into these markings as otherwise they will be disrespected.

As to the adjudication decision Mr Mustard notes the following.

Hearns Coaches have not in the last decade taken a London PCN to the tribunal so don't appear to be habitual offenders (they may of course simply pay PCN when they get them).

The adjudicator had no choice in the matter as there are limited exceptions to stopping on school keep clear markings (fire, police, ambulance & like ilk).

The morning pickup might have been outside of restricted hours hence the lack of a PCN from that time & besides it wouldn't have presented a defence to the contravention.

The coach driver is in charge of the coach. Would they have driven at 50mph in the 30 zone if a teacher told him to? Would they have turned left where not allowed? Would they go through a no entry just to please the teacher? No, no & no, so why he/she parked on the keep clear markings is an interesting question. The answer we do know is that in the future the coach driver will not stop on a school keep clear marking. Mr Mustard's advice to teachers is to not try and teach coach drivers how to drive or park (did the teacher even hold a driving licence?) and leave them to do their job.

Coach drivers; simply ask the teacher to agree to pay any PCN issued as a result of their ignorant instructions. That will concentrate their mind.

Mr Mustard will try to find out what Barnet Council decide to do about the penalty i.e. whether they accept the recommendation of the adjudicator.

There is only about 1 PCN a day on each school keep clear marking so this mass installation of very expensive cameras won't make a profit and will thus, most probably, get moved to more profitable sites. 

Sod safety, raise revenue.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard