You need to think when you drive - be rational

 

When the J Sainsbury supermarket came to North Finchley many moons ago there was a concern about the number of cars which would drive along Ravensdale Avenue, a fine residential road. Therefore, the road sytem was engineered to force traffic to enter and leave the supermarket car park via the High Road. 

Some people think they can drive up the wrong side of the road and they rightly receive their comeuppance (Mr Mustard does not condone dangerous driving).

 

Don't make dangerous manoeuvres.

The end. 

Desperate for cash - Barnet Council

The owner of the vehicle (a small amount of which is overhanging the yellow box junction) was somewhat surprised to receive a PCN in the post for the alleged contravention of 'Entering and stopping in a box junction when prohibited'.

A heinous crime obviously (not).

What could he have done or what should you do if you encounter this situation?

1    Move forward as the gap to the car in front is huge.

2    Go up the inside lane

3    Turn right (as is an exemption).

Mr Mustard has made representations that any contravention is 'de minimis non curat lex' i.e. a Court (or tribunal) does not concern itself with trifles.

Looked at from above this is a box which is far longer than it needs to be and the mouth of the junction does not need to be that wide as there is a weight limit on the side road so does not need to accommodate huge trucks which means that a narrower entry would slow traffic down and make crossing for pedestrians (Sainsburys are on the corner) much safer.

The change of political control on 5 May 2022 has not softened the ruthless, relentless and venal issuing of Penalty Charge Notices.

The end.

Barnet Council - a costly assumption

This decision has been brought to Mr Mustard's attention by a friend who is looking at all costs award cases in the last couple of years at the tribunal. Barnet only had the one which is more a reflection of how hard it is to get a costs award than of their good behaviour.

This is the yellow box near Sainsburys in North Finchley. If turning left off the High Road it is now in the Highway Code that a motorist should let a pedestrian cross so we might see some more PCNs like this one.

The amount awarded is still less than the value of the PCN (£130). Every PCN found to be wrong should be the subject of a fixed costs award, that would bring some balance to a lop-sided system.

End

People power in N12

When Barnet Council make an experimental traffic order, which can last for up to 18 months, they don't have to consult as an affected party can make representations at any time in the first 6 months.

However, it is a little arrogant, if not slightly stupid, to increase the restricted hours for residents 

from Monday to Saturday 9am to 5pm 

to a daily 9am to 9.30pm

when residents in the zone generally have not asked for any change. Mr Mustard thinks that residents of the two roads which envelope Solar House, into which St Barnabas Church has moved, did raise concerns with the council. The first that most residents knew of the plans was a leaflet through their door just before the new arrangements were about to start and the rush also bothered them. The vicar of the church didn't know and was horrified that they could be the indirect cause of bad feeling. The three ward councillors didn't know either which is rank bad manners on the part of council officers (staff) as it is councillors who are first in line to take the flak.

Why was the experimental order necessary? It was assumed that the church would generate lots of unwanted parking in residential roads seven days a week which doesn't seem that likely. What the council should have done was to:

1. survey out of hours and weekend parking occupancy.

2. let the church services commence.

3. re-survey the parking occupancy to see which, if any roads, were affected.

4. consult with affected residents about proposals for new hours and/or days.

As it happens the church seems to be very well run. The vicar asked the congregation what they should do and they do have 57 spaces of their own to start with. The congregation have decided to use the Lodge Lane car park on a Sunday as it is a 4 minute walk and far nearer than the roads in which the ridiculous new hours were introduced and then withdrawn on the their first day, such as Woodhouse Lane, Torrington Park where it abuts Friary Park & half of Sandringham Gardens which runs into Summers Lane and in which no-one would ever have parked for visiting Solar House.

So now we have a council which has introduced an experimental order, put up all new bay signs and then on the very day that the new restrictions came into force used the Chief Executive's powers to suspend the order that only came into that day at 9am. Councils keep complaining that they are short of money and yet they waste tens of thousands by introducing ill thought out and self evidently unwanted changes. Each bay sign costs something in the region of £70 and there will have been hundreds of them because every bay in 19 roads needed the times changed. Luckily it seems the old signs had not yet been consigned to the scrap metal skip and they have now been put back up again.

Mr Mustard was in a meeting with a resident last week and it looks like the council are now going to be faced with a well organised group of residents who are not going to be pushed around. If the church congregation behaves as considerately as they say they will, there isn't going to be a problem which needs further controls in any case.

Any resident of the NF CPZ who gets asked to respond to the annual council satisfaction survey isn't likely to be complimentary.

When will council staff start to understand that they are public servants, not our masters, and the public are not going to put up with every stupid idea they dream up.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard 

Oktoberfest - N12

This sounds like fun, get yourselves a ticket before they sell out.

Prost.

Mr Senf

Grand Arcade

Mr Mustard met the amazing octogenarian Keith Martin on Saturday, having co-incidentally, just exited the balloon shop. Keith's wife had painted this card and full of energy as ever Keith was taking the direct approach to sales and visiting local shopkeepers.

The A5 sized card with envelope costs £1.50 (+ postage if ordered from keith.martin18@btinternet.comkeith.martin18@btinternet.com which Mr Mustard, who gave Waitrose £3.50 for a birthday card the other day (emergency purchase and the newsagent was closed otherwise it would have been 89p) thinks that is very good value as thank you cards or for writing short notes to friends.

Keith is a local publisher, and you will find interesting books on local history and other subjects here.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard

Peace One Day - 21 September

Task and Finish (off the traders) Group

Look, pedestrians, probably spending money in local shops

Last night Mr Mustard attended, along with other local business people and concerned residents, an open meeting of the Task & Finish Group about the possibility of installing cash parking meters once again.

Very little notice was given of the meetings and local bloggers, activists and residents associations, as well as the local paper all spread the word.

There were five people who had asked to speak (Mr Mustard had misunderstood, he put his evidence in and rather thought councillors would decide who they wanted to hear from but no, you self selected) and they all spoke eloquently of the devastation to their businesses (Helen Michael of Cafe Buzz and Paul Shea of Tally Ho Discount (very good for fruit and veg), both of which businesses mostly get paid in cash so their customers evidently have it to hand) and of changes to their shopping patterns (residents Barbara & Bob Jacobson) which led them to go places where parking is easier to pay for or free. There was a fair bit of heckling when Gail Laser, who represents the traders of High Barnet was refused permission as she hadn't put in her request in time and Cllr Gordon managed to get himself into a bit of a knot by saying he had only heard of traders from North Finchley and then refuse for a spare 5 minutes of time to be given to Gail who some councillors, and most of the audience, wanted to hear from.

Dan of the Barnet Bugle was doing sterling service as per usual, see his footage here, Mr Mustard showed his appreciation afterwards by buying him a pint of shandy in the Greyhound and shocked the staff by telling them that he had been under-charged. They totalled up his round again and accepted another £3.60 from him. You can't slip an obvious error by Mr Mustard.

When it came to the question of the whole galaxy of written submission, which councillors had probably all read in advance, Mr Mustard rather expected some open discussion of them. That was not to be. Instead Cllr Dean Cohen was allowed to the table to tell us how marvellous things were in High Barnet and Mill Hill and so on, based upon just one written submission, the one that partly favoured not having cash but in which it was pointed out that most of the provision in High Barnet is private car parking and takes cash. You couldn't make it up.

Anyone, then thank goodness Cllr Gordon said something which probably had the "Leader" Richard Cornelius groaning (Mr Mustard was in the front row and hadn't seen Richard come in from some other meeting) inwardly (Mr Mustard did invite Richard for a pint in the Greyhound but he had the missus with him, the Leaderene as she is apparently known so Mr Mustard offered to buy her a drink as well. Fighting back is very civilised in High Barnet but neither of them showed up). Anyway what Cllr Gordon asked aloud was

Is this (return of cash meters) economically viable?

How would it affect the budget?

What cuts would have to be made elsewhere?

If ever you wanted proof that Barnet Council is involved in illegal revenue raising from parking then that was it.

As an aside this morning a PATAS adjudicator asked Mr Mustard why he helped people with their appeals. He told her there were 9 reasons of which one was that the council were using parking tickets as revenue raisers (they all do that in London she said, whilst earning £50 an hour as part of the process!) and another that donations get made for charity. She described Mr Mustard's behaviour as strange which it may be but it also effective (although he was on a very rare review of an Appeal, which was granted, so the PCN was back in play for a second Appeal but his client blatantly parked where another person wouldn't have done and has probably done himself in despite the best efforts of Mr Mustard on the technical side).

There was one written submission which was sent to councillors but not to governance so it didn't get published. It is rather good so here it is in full:

To: 'cllr.b.gordon@barnet.gov.uk'; 'cllr.r.houston@barnet.gov.uk'; 'cllr.h.rayner@barnet.gov.uk'; 'cllr.j.scannell@barnet.gov.uk'; 'cllr.a.schneiderman@barnet.gov.uk'
Subject: Parking Policy (Cash Meters) Task and Finish Group


Dear Councillors

We are writing to you to implore you to bring back cash parking meters to our car parks and high streets.

Since November 2011 when the meters were disabled trade has been drastically down.

Time and time again first time customers who have made a dedicated trip to our specialist sweet and sugarcraft shop have been so frustrated that they cannot pay for parking and let us know that they will not be returning. You cannot expect people from other boroughs to register for pay by phone or risk searching for a scratch card vendor. They simply will not do it and to pretend that we’ve all got to move with the times is nonsense and ignores the facts: cashless parking is killing the high streets. This is not a situation where one solution is the fix and pay by phone and card payment methods are what is required in addition to cash payments.

In light of our current national economic circumstances the council should be doing all it can to help bring trade to our high streets rather than put up barriers. With the unfair competition from the expansion of out of town shopping centres and the redevelopment of Brent Cross (which have plentiful free parking) we need to make sure that the vitality of our local communities is maintained. The restoration of cash parking would be a start, periods of free parking such as free after three would then be a small step in the right direction.

Please bring back cash parking meters!

Yours sincerely,

Alice and Michael Kentish

Hopscotch

88 High Street, Barnet, Herts, EN5 5SN

There is another meeting on Thursday at 7pm at which the decision will be taken as to whether to recommend the return of cash meters or not. Please do go as Mr Mustard can't make that one.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard

PayByPhone locations

Mr Mustard asked for these uncontroversial numbers last year but they were asked for during the period when he was annoying the council too much by asking too many questions so they were deemed to be a vexatious question. Now the council have themselves published them and an email from the Barnet Bugle pointing Mr Mustard at them gave him the idea of converting the pdf (a completely useless way of publishing a table) to a spreadsheet, so here it is so that you can play with it (you can download it yourself and use a filter to sort the entries with)

former Parking Meter and relative Cashless Location numbers by MisterMustard

What you can gain from this is the ability to sort the list into different orders and count up payable locations by town centre. Mr Mustard can only find 2 locations where you have to pay in the Leader's ward of Totteridge and the greatest number (about 70) are of course in North Finchley which is treated as a parking piggy bank; one day it will be empty and then the council will be sorry.

What you can also find in this list is loads of secondary locations where payment should not be the order of the day but 4 hour free bays would be better (residents couldn't hog them and they would provide sufficient time for visitors to do most things and for the rest they could perhaps get a visitor voucher). Mr Mustard also wonders about allowing 1 hour free parking in any Residents Bay as for most of the day they are half empty.

Mr Mustard also wonders why we weren't allocated a discrete block of numbers so that when you transpose two digits, or get one of them wrong, you don't find yourself paying for parking in another borough or another country and the money at least ends up at the correct tariff in the correct bank account?

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard

rather than have Mr Mustard spend hours working out why you can only download as a pdf and not as the original xls document I uploaded, if you want an .xls version, simply email me at mrmustard@zoho.com and you will be sent one.

Worked it out. Go to scribd

scribd link for paybyphone locations xls download

select download and then choose .xls, simples

North Finchley cafe invites seniors to "Supper and Songs"

North Finchley's Cafe Buzz has launched a musical supper club for seniors - Supper and Songs. A special discounted menu will be accompanied by a selection of classic songs in a bid to create a friendly place for older residents to eat healthy food and meet new people

Supper and Songs is a joint project created by Age UK Barnet and Cafe Buzz. It is a new initiative to bring people together around delicious, affordable food in a friendly atmosphere where they can eat to the music they loved in their younger days.

The first Supper and Songs is at 5 pm on Monday October 28 - traditional meal and coffee will cost £6 

or 

for a full dinner with soup and pudding, Supper and Songs will cost £9.

Cafe Buzz owner Helen Michael said: "I was delighted when approached about this. It's hard to prepare real nutritious food when you're older and I'm excited about turning the cafe into a place where older people can feel at home."

Managing the scheme at Age UK Barnet is Karen Williamson: "We find that older people can fall into poor eating habits at home. This is a perfect way to both improve their diet and offer a chance to make new friends."

For more information call Cafe Buzz on 020 8446 9906.

---

So if you have £6 or £9 to spare and know an old person who would enjoy an evening out then why not book them a place and pay for it and/or give them a lift there and back. 

Yours frugally (and dinner for £6 with entertainment is pretty frugal) 

Mr Mustard

Free talk - Wednesday 16 October at 7pm

THE  BOHEMIA

762 High Road, North Finchley

FRIERN  BARNET  LIBRARY  REOPENED

A talk by 

Phoenix, Daniel Gardonyi & Keith Martin

Wednesday 16 October 2013 at 7pm

This is a free event, and copies of

Friern Barnet – the library that refused to close will be available for purchase at £10.99, of which £2 per copy will be donated to Friern Barnet Community Library.

 

www.chavillepress.co.uk

Social & PCN club - Monday 12 August at 7pm

Usual place : The Bohemia at North Finchley, the community pub.

Usual time: 7pm till 9pm or so.

Usual chat: about anything at all that you like, in a group or two of you sat quietly in a corner, whatever.

If you have a PCN that you want to ask Mr Mustard about then pop along with all, and I mean all, of your paperwork. You will get a candid assessment of your chances of getting it cancelled.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard

Dear Miss Michael, Mr Mustard is sorry.

Dear Miss Michael

Mr Mustard is sorry as he thinks he should accept a modicum of responsibility for what happened to you in the High Rd last September when you were the victim of a common assault by Cllr (acting in his private capacity per the council's smoke machine) Brian Coleman.

Mr Mustard emailed Brian when he lost his seat on the London Assembly in May 2012 (he lost his head locally!) and suggested, amongst other things, the following,

“I think you need a new approach.

It would involve:-

listening to others

treating them with respect

carefully considering their opinions

not forcing your own opinions on them

accepting that bloggers are part of the political landscape in 2012

reversing most of the decisions you have taken recently ( i.e. reduce CPZ charges and install parking meters, keeping public parks public and so on).

You need a complete change of mentality and image. You need to become Brian “Cuddly” Coleman or some other more people friendly image.”

Now when Mr Mustard wrote that advice he didn't think Brian would interpret it as meaning he should get all up close and personal with you in September 12 (keep your friends close and your enemies closer, he certainly couldn't have got much close) as the cctv shows (thank goodness he wasn't the cabinet member with responsibility for cctv and so this footage couldn't get lost)

Now that isn't at all like what Mr Mustard would call cuddling, it is better described as undignified grappling, conduct unbecoming of a gentleman and a councillor.

Brian was lucky he didn't get a parking ticket, there is never a traffic warden around when you really need one.

You Helen should be given the freedom of the borough but you can realistically expect nothing but silence and a refusal to accept what Brian did from amongst his former cabinet colleagues. Mr Mustard might be wrong, as soon as he is back from his holidays Richard Cornelius will be straight into Cafe Buzz to offer his personal and heartfelt apologies for failing to act with decision and honour and I know you will accept his apology with dignity, which is the whole way in which you have conducted yourself since you became the queen of the parking resistance.

For those readers who haven't been to North Finchley for some time, do please go there. There is free car parking in the car parks today (Lodge Lane is nearest to Cafe Buzz).  Mr Mustard doesn't drink coffee very often as he is a tea person, he can vouch for the tea being excellent (oops Mr Mustard left without paying for 2 cups yesterday) and others do enjoy the coffees (and Mrs Angry was consuming an enormous portion of chocolate cake yesterday which was self evidently excellent). He can vouch for the breakfasts which are served all day.

Free parking again tomorrow on the bank holiday. There are other good shops in N Finchley (Waterstones and Tally Ho fruit and veg to name but two - don't forget Mr Mustard's home of High Barnet either with Hopscotch Sweets being well worth a visit)

Sorry, once again for putting ideas into Brian's head.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard

Injecting with botox whilst Barnet Council apply the leeches

A leech, stay well away!

Mr Mustard wants our high streets to remain otherwise one day we will all be born, come home from hospital if they still exist, and not leave home again until we go out in a box and that is not the kind of society that appeals to Mr Mustard.

Mr Mustard was invited to attend the launch event of the Future of North Finchley at the Arts Depot and he duly did having also blogged the poster for others to see.

There was an introduction by David Longstaff, a talk by Sally Williams of Retail Revival, another by Liza Fior of MUF Architects (MUF stands for Modern Urban Fabric) another by Tracey Cooper of ArtsDepot, another by a local resident Brenda Goldberg (not Barbara as she was styled on the invite, oh dear a lack of attention to detail there) and then finally Helen Michael the queen of parking got up to speak.

Mr Mustard has a couple of bones to pick. Sally denied, with respect to Mr Mustard's interjection about money on shopfronts in High Barnet perhaps not being the best example of what to spend on, that money had been spent on Cafe Pacino which has since closed down. Bloggers remember lots of detail. Here is what the Barnet Residents Association had to say in their newsletter

In the lower half of the High St two shops, Chudys and Cover - along with Café Pacino in Church Passage - were similarly treated along with the provision of new awnings. The next task of course, and decidedly more difficult, is getting other shops to create more tasteful frontages that will contribute to the overall kerb appeal of the town.

Now Mr Mustard does think Sally is on our side but he will have to put what she says through a verification filter from now on. A bad start but every dog gets two bites.

Lisa Fior of MUF architecture said "we have used the bloggers", No Liza. We are independent, there were two of us there, + Dan of the Barnet Bugle (a newspaper that looks like a blog) and we did not confer before advertising the event or afterwards about what we would write, if anything. We decide individually what, when, why and how we write. Barnet Council should not be proud of the number of bloggers that write about Barnet (and there are more than the famous five, see the side bar to the left) they should be sitting up and taking notice and trying to be so boringly efficient, display so much common sense and good judgment and spend money so wisely that there is absolutely nothing to write about (a vision that Mr Mustard hopes will one day come to pass).

Helen got up to speak and of course most things had been said by then. She also wasn't given much notice that she had to speak and so it was off the cuff. Helen loves North Finchley as she lives and works there but gagging her by telling her not to talk about parking was pretty stupid.

Not Helen Michael (gagged) but an ex parking meter (bagged)

There are lots of problems facing the High Street although exactly what they all are and the size of each problem is a subject that one could argue about in the Bohemia for hours on end. One problem is simple to solve. We know that traders across the borough saw falls in trade of 30% to 40% as soon as coin operated parking meters were taken away and for most this will have turned their profits into losses. Put back coin operated meters (yes they could also take credit cards) and trade will magically improve to somewhere near where it was 2 years ago (the charges also need to be lower and there should be more free parking bays - calm down cyclists, you will get thought of)

So as soon as the speechifying was over Paul Shea of Tally Ho Discount (and now also selling lots of low priced fruit and vegetables - follow him on twitter @thfruitandveg ) was away like a pack of hounds after a fox and asked about parking. Everyone wanted to talk about parking except Barnet Council and its consultants. The council and its consultants want people to give up their time to make North Finchley a better place which is all right up to a point but why do we pay council tax or business rates,  is it just to fund the £130,000 salary of the Director of Place who wasn't in attendance, and most people are pretty busy, Helen, for example, works at least 12 hours a day 7 days a week and many other traders are having to work long hours to try and improve their turnover or to cover for staff they could no longer afford to employ once the council kicked them in the shins. So really the council should do all of the work because it is why they are there; people should simply be asked to contribute ideas.

There were only about 100 people at the launch. There should have been a lot more. That was fewer than half of the traders there and hardly any residents. Publicity of these events needs a much greater effort in future. Mr Mustard has had a business in Barnet, with a registered office having a Barnet postcode for a lot of the time, for 25 years and he cannot recall more than one approach from the council on a business matter (and that was whether he was interested in bidding to collect poll tax from which he ran a mile) and so he wonders how many businesses Barnet Council just don't know about. In Mr Mustard's road of 30+ properties there are 14 businesses run from home and he doubts that Barnet Council know about more than one of them. An architect who lives and works in North Finchley was spitting nails because he only heard about the event as he is a member of the folk club.

What the council does do is take away easy payment methods and give us hard ones that don't cater for all of the populace (unlike cash which does) and squeeze the motorist for over £12 million giving them a net annual profit from parking (income and parking tickets) after costs of £5 million of £7.5 million. The council should simply aim to break even from parking and no more. The council are hindering the high streets by taxing them out of existence.

Mr Mustard noted down one or two of Helen's ideas. She wanted coin operated parking meters but didn't say so as she was asked not to, she wanted to improve footfall, she wanted to get University business students into one of the empty shops so all the latest idea would pour forth, she wants a website listing all of North Finchley's businesses, she wants the Finchley carnival back, she wants better Xmas lights, she wants to improve the market and possibly relocate it and generally she wanted the town centre to be accessible and attractive partly by making it much greener.

There was some anger that the £1.1m (not Boris's money but our money) seemed to have been carved up into chunks already without the traders and locals having had their input into what they would like to see which bespeaks of the usual council arrogance and it is clear that the 2 council officers who are charged with getting the Town Team that is to be formed are going to find it challenging (as problems are euphemistically called these days) but they have both shown themselves prepared to listen even though they don't have the authority to sort out the debacle which is parking but the face lift that they are charged with managing will be to no avail until the council remove the blood sucking leeches from the legs of the patient.

Dean Cohen was another councillor notable for not being there and David Longstaff who should have stepped in when the meeting was going all wrong (you can read Roger's report here) sat on his hands. Mr Mustard has been in touch with Sally, Liza and David and given them his tuppenceworth and he will be of positive help once parking meters are installed.

An ugly rumour has reached Mr Mustard that there are plans afoot to spend £30,000 on new rubbish bins. What is the point of asking for ideas if someone in authority has already taken a decision. £30k on new bins would be a waste. Does anyone go to a high street elsewhere for shopping because they have new rubbish bins? No. £30k would buy 6 or 7 coin operated parking meters. That Mr Mustard and probably every trader in North Finchley would vote for.

What else would Mr Mustard like to see?:

A tram, look here is one in High Barnet

and another at Tally Ho

they would be so much better than buses. Mr Mustard would use them all the time and leave the blogger bus at home. Trams would reduce town centre pollution levels which are, he is told, very bad in North Finchley.

If we want people to cycle to work then facilities have to be provided. There is a cycle shop in North Finchley (Shorter Rochford) but it is on the edge of the shopping district in Woodhouse Rd. What is really needed is a cycle shop that does sales, repairs and all day secure bike storage, lockers and showers if we really are going to get an uptake in the use of cycles. No-one wants to sit next to a sweaty colleague so showers are a must and most shops and offices won't have any.

Mr Mustard loves French towns with their town square. He would create one in North Finchley. How? He would compulsorily purchase the building that stand between the Lodge Lane car park and the High Rd and make a square that joins to the High Rd. Shops could be built around the edge of the square with restaurants and offices above and flats above them. Car parking could be provided in a car park underneath the square. That is what they do in France and we should copy them. The council will say it is a lot of money but this is the sort of project that the council should be looking at to make the town a place to visit rather than trying to concrete over Cricklewood / Brent X. Look at this corner of a square in Bordeaux, Mr Mustard just wants to go there this minute, we need to develop the same feeling for all of the town centres of Barnet, not just North Finchley.

Bordeaux

Mr Mustard does hope that coin operated parking meters and other good things do come out of this opportunity.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard