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Why did parking wardens walk past this car?
• IN April, when I complained about confusing parking signs, I wrote: “I feel like buying myself an unregistered car from a dump, forgetting to purchase road tax or insurance, leaving it parked indiscriminately in the middle of Tottenham Court Road, where I feel sure I would be able to return to it safely un-ticketed up to six weeks later, rather than being so persecuted…”
I attach a photograph of a car, currently parked in Great Russell Street on a single yellow line outside the entrance to the YMCA, as it has been for at least two days. The three parking tickets on the windscreen have been there for some time, as all are covered by the same grime and oil as the rest of the car. There is no evidence of any recent attention by a traffic warden, although there are many passing.
The car is on the street perpendicular to that on which I parked my car on a single yellow line when I received a ticket in April. But then, my car doesn’t have a broken wing mirror, several dents, a distorted bonnet and a steering wheel held together with parcel-tape. Somehow this fiendishly contrived disguise has managed to protect this car from being recognised as a parked vehicle. Amazing!
If I had parked my car in this spot in this fashion, being an obviously well-looked-after, though aged, Rover 75 it is fair odds it would have received a ticket within half an hour, been clamped within an hour and then removed completely very shortly thereafter.
I was ticketed within 10 minutes on that April Fool’s Day for an infraction I didn’t even know existed. Is this not further proof that there is one draconian and money-extracting law for law-abiding citizens and a more reasonable laissez-faire law for those who regularly flout the rules without any fear of recrimination?
I feel insulted by the continued presence of this car, of which the wardens seem oblivious, confirming as it does the dual standards currently exercised by Camden.
I would now like Camden to refund my parking ticket on the basis that there is no clear policy in place for ticketing illegally-parked vehicles.
The law should apply to all, regardless of ability to pay, or the likelihood of Camden being able to extract payment.
ROBIN MACKAY MILLER
Constantine Road, NW3
FEEDBACK
In April, reader Robin Mackay Miller highlighted Camden Council’s money-grabbing parking policies. This week, he wonders how fairly they are applied
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