LEAVE the bumper of your car dangling a few inches over a yellow line or exceed your welcome in a parking bay by a few minutes and the chances are that Edinburgh's enthusiastic parking wardens will ticket you.
But dump your car thoughtlessly in the middle of the road or on a pavement and they can't touch you without summoning the police. What a ludicrous situation – but as things stand at the moment, that's exactly what happens.
People who double park
are a menace to other road users and pedestrians and, by obstructing the emergency services, pose a direct threat to human life.
Almost two years ago, this newspaper exposed the dangers they posed, which prompted the previous council administration to enter into talks with the Scottish Executive to change the law to allow wardens to hit them with £60 on-the-spot fines.
While it is to be welcomed that these discussions between the new Government and the recently elected administration are continuing, it is somewhat baffling that addressing what appears on the surface to be a relatively simple problem has taken so long when the Executive seemed supportive of the move.
The proposal drawn up for Edinburgh copies one which is operating effectively in London, where responsibility for dealing with offences such as double-parking passed from police to councils. Today the city council highlights the worst hot-spots for double parking but real action is limited to handing out leaflets in those areas to discourage the practice. The selfish people who persistently double park are hardly going to pay much attention to a scrap of paper and their behaviour is unlikely to change until faced with a suitable deterrent.
Not surprisingly, the worst affected parts of town contain narrow residential streets with a high proportion of flats. Yeaman Place, for instance, is a 24-hour chicane. But while parking provision in these areas rarely meets demand, possession of a valid permit does not give the owner carte blanche to double park, park on corners or pavements and obstruct the roadway.
The police have better things to do with their time than deal with inconsiderate parkers. But although it goes against the grain to call for more powers for parking wardens, their attention would be far better directed against those making a real nuisance of themselves rather than boosting council coffers by targeting law-abiding drivers who fall foul of the rules by a matter of inches or a few minutes.
The full article contains 421 words and appears in Edinburgh Evening News newspaper.
