Footway Parking (Scotland ) Bill, survey.

[Ron]

A survey for road and footway users in Scotland.
http://www.smartsurvey.co.uk/s/FootwayD ... rkingBill/

[Tonyf33]

filled it in, they could make a packet out of fining motorists for stuff like that. They'll make far too many exceptions to the bill though and it'll be meaningless and pedestrians/cyclists will still be put at risk.

[Ellieb]

Seems like a good idea except for the bit where it says the dropped kerb ban doesn't apply to residential properties!!

[Adam S]

Those dropped kerbs are provided to facilitate vehicular access to those residential properties. No public nuisance is created if a person decides to park near one. Footway users are affected by the other type of dropped kerb provided for the benefit of the those with wheel/pushchairs.

[Lance Dopestrong]

If someone parks across your driveway and you can't get your car out I'm pretty sure you'd regard it as a nuisance.

[Adam S]

A private nuisance. I dare say you would also be pretty aggrieved if you got ticketed for parking across your own driveway! This bill is not about maintaining private access. It is about ensuring people can travel safely down the public footway.

[Ellieb]

If someone parks across your driveway and you can't get your car out I'm pretty sure you'd regard it as a nuisance.

This +1
I can understand the Government saying it isn't worthwhile introducing a bill to specifically outlaw parking across driveways, although I'd always assumed, that like parking on the pavement, this was a legislative oversight. It seems perverse to be putting forward a bill like this and then deliberately excluding people's driveways. It is as if they are tacitly approving drivers doing so and that ain't right.

[Adam S]

I can confidently say that there would be many more householders objecting if a law prohibiting parking next to the dropped kerbs outside their houses was introduced and enforced.

[Ellieb]

Really? Most people I know with driveways park on their driveways. They could easily make it so the offence wouldn't cover the householder if they wanted to.

[Lance Dopestrong]

A private nuisance. I dare say you would also be pretty aggrieved if you got ticketed for parking across your own driveway! This bill is not about maintaining private access. It is about ensuring people can travel safely down the public footway.

How is preventing you accessing the highway in any way a private problem?

[sirmy]

".......although I'd always assumed, that like parking on the pavement, this was a legislative oversight"

There was a clause in the 1974 Highways Act (section 7) which made parking on a footway an offence -

"7Prohibition of parking of vehicles on verges, central reservations and footways

(1)After section 36A of the 1972 Act (prohibition of parking of heavy commercial vehicles on verges and footways) there shall be inserted the following section:— “Prohibition of parking of vehicles on verges, central reservations and footways.

36B(1)Subject to the provisions of this section, a person who parks a vehicle, other than a heavy commercial vehicle, within the meaning of section 36A of this Act, wholly or partly—

(a)on the verge of an urban road, or

(b)on any land which is situated between two carriageways of an urban road and which is not a footway, or

(c)on a footway comprised in an urban road,

shall be guilty of an offence."

Unfortunatley the police complained they didn't have the resources to enforce the clause so, rather than provide the resources, parliamnet repealed the clause without it ever being enacted ("Ss. 6–15, 20–22 repealed by Road Traffic (Consequential Provisions) Act 1988 (c. 54, SIF 107:1), ss. 3, 5, Sch. 1 Pt. I, Sch. 4 paras. 1–3")

Once again money trumps public safety

[Bicycler]

I hope this bill does succeed. It is a necessary piece of legislation as pavement parking has got out of control.

Re: the driveways tangent this thread has headed down. I think the terminology "private nuisance" is technically correct. A "public nuisance" concerns things which are a nuisance to the public in general, not a single person or residence.

Regardless of the merits of any such law relating to residential properties (and I can see two sides of this argument). I don't think it ought to appear in this bill.

FWIW, I think the wording here is the problem. It is clearly intended to prevent vehicles from blocking dropped kerbs provided for pedestrian use of the footway. If it had been worded accordingly I cannot see that anyone would object. Phrasing it in the way they did (ie. specifying dropped kerbs and then exempting those for residential properties) leads to Ellie's "tacit approval" interpretation.

[ambodach]

Dropped kerbs for pedestrian use are more useful for pushchairs and wheelchairs. As a wheelchair "driver" I get really annoyed at cars blocking them as it makes life much more stressful..

[MikeF]

If someone parks across your driveway and you can't get your car out I'm pretty sure you'd regard it as a nuisance.

Is that illegal not just a nuisance, but preventing you driving into your driveway is a nuisance?

[Elizabeth_S]

Pavement parking really annoys me, the other day I saw a lorry parked up on the footway next to the old A9 out of Dunblane right across the verge, pavement and up to a wall; this is a footway and a cycle route. The only way people could get past is by walking out into a dual carriage way with cars doing 50 mph. And there is a very large bus stop 50 m away where he could have stopped. (He was actually parked up at or very near a spot a driver killed a cyclist http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/4311609.stm.)