Zig Zag Lines

Every so often I come across people who park on the Zig-Zag lines and whenever I take the time to tell them that they shouldn't I usually get one of the following:

i. The anglo-saxon variant of 'go away',

ii. 'I'm only waiting for someone who's in the shops,'

iii. 'I'm only going to be a few minutes,' and

iv. 'I'm making a delivery, I'll only be a few minutes. I always park here and no one ever minds!'

Well it was answer number four today  - so asking the Highway Code  - Parking 240 (rule 191) -about zig-zag lines. we find that:

You MUST NOT park on a crossing or in the area covered by the zig-zag lines. 
You MUST NOT overtake the moving vehicle nearest the crossing or the vehicle nearest the crossing which has stopped to give way to pedestrians.

[Laws ZPPPCRGD regs 18, 20 & 24, RTRA sect 25(5) & TSRGD regs 10, 27 & 28]

Now doing either of the things above is an offence under the Road Traffic Act (no, it's not a ticket like yellow lines) and it will win you a £60 fixed penalty and 3 points on your driving licence.

That said, you can go to court and explain how you ALWAYS do it and how no one has ever minded and you can pay more and get 6 points on your licence.

Better still, if you do this within two years of having passed your driving test you'll get to resit the theory and practical tests and then, if you pass, you can continue driving with 3 points on your licence and a lot of money gone from your wallet.

Please

Don't park on a zig-zag (or anywhere dangerous) because I get the most unenviable task of burying, or visiting in hospital, the people that get damaged from such stupidity. 

Please don't think that 'it's only a few minutes' for it takes but a few seconds to have one of the many children from our local schools hit as they (often without enough care) scoot across that crossing.

Thank You

Fast Cars and Blondes

A combination destined to turn heads: Well this one was for she was the talk of the store as I entered. Seems that everyone was rather impressed at the parking.

Prize of the day goes to the bloke who said, 'If you parked sideways you could take up the whole !!**$$!! row, duck!'

Mind you, I didn't think it was that good, after all it wasn't central now, was it?

Driving others mad - Parking

I don't know about you guys out there but one of the things that really causes me grief from time to time is the naff driving habits of other people. One of these manifests itself in the art of parking our vehicles, an art which appears to be out of reach of some of us.

Every now and then I find oddly parked cars that scream out to be photographed, especially when there are no parking spaces in the car park where these muppets have placed themselves so badly.

Here's the current top three for August:

In third place we have 'Abandoned?'

Second place goes to 'I knew I needed a smaller car'

And the winner is 'Was that parallel or perpendicular parking? I forget!!'