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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

School parking.....

110 replies

Shirleycantbe · 03/09/2015 16:25

My childrens' school is in a resident parking area in London - at pick up time the bays are Residents only. It's therefore a nightmare for any one to park and people ignore the residents only rule - thus putting themselves at risk of being ticketed by the traffic wardens that roam the streets at that time. The residents also get extremely irate (understandably) that the street is difficult for them to park in between 3pm and 4pm.

Now my question. As I live in the same borough, I have Visitor parking permits I can use that allow me, legally, to park in the street at any time. I have been doing this once a week maximum (my children finish school after restrictions have ended at other times).

The school ask parents not to park in these bays because it annoys the residents. AIBU to park there anyway since I am legally entitled to?

OP posts:
Andrewofgg · 06/09/2015 07:31

When I'm PM (one day) I'm going to ban preposterous suggestions about what to ban next Grin

XCChamps · 06/09/2015 07:36

I think any road with a school on it should be closed for, say, 20 mins at drop off and pick up time. It would encourage more people to walk, if they're going to have to walk the last bit anyway, would make the roads outside school safer for those who do walk and would massively reduce polution, if people had to turn off their engines and walk to the school rather than sitting outside for ages with them running.

Some practical things to work through, but I'm sure it could be done.

Andrewofgg · 06/09/2015 09:06

XCChamps So you want to lock people who may have jobs to go to, relations to look after, all the thousand-and-one non-child-related things that people do by car, into or out of their homes twice a day in the time?

What about schools on main roads? I went to a school which was on the main A14 road - since bypassed, mercifully - which carried much of Britain's commerce!

No. It could not be done.

Andrewofgg · 06/09/2015 09:07
  • twice a day in the term-time
Collaborate · 06/09/2015 09:08

I think any road with a school on it should be closed for, say, 20 mins at drop off and pick up time. It would encourage more people to walk, if they're going to have to walk the last bit anyway, would make the roads outside school safer for those who do walk and would massively reduce polution, if people had to turn off their engines and walk to the school rather than sitting outside for ages with them running.

Some practical things to work through, but I'm sure it could be done.

What preposterous twaddle! So, you'd have traffic enforcement officers at every school twice a day. Would you close it off to all traffic, or just to school traffic? In which case, how could you tell which was which? Or, to "solve" the problem of fewer parking spaces for residents, you'd stop everyone from parking there (or even leaving their homes).

All so a little Englander can be encouraged to think they own the parcel of road outside their home.

Andrewofgg · 06/09/2015 09:31

The real vice of the suggestion is that it treats the needs of the school-age child parents as trumping the needs of everyone else. Not unusual, but wrong.

InimitableJeeves · 06/09/2015 09:43

Who are these special snowflakes who are so shattered after a day in school that they can't walk for 10 minutes? We lived 12 minutes away from my dcs' school, I would never have contemplated picking them up by car unless they were actually injured or ill.

Collaborate · 06/09/2015 09:58

Who are these special snowflakes who are so shattered after a day in school that they can't walk for 10 minutes? We lived 12 minutes away from my dcs' school, I would never have contemplated picking them up by car unless they were actually injured or ill.

Presumably if you're driving to a local shop you park a 10 min walk away. To do otherwise would make you a hypocrite.

Andrewofgg · 06/09/2015 09:59

After age 10/11 DS only got a lift if he had exceptionally heavy items to take - not just ordinary sports kit - or one of us happened to be going that way, which was unusual. One stop on the tube or a short bus journey. As the tube station was uphill from the school and the school was uphill from the bus-stop the idle bugger quickly learnt to take the tube in and the bus out!

SirChenjin · 06/09/2015 10:04

Who on earth drives to a local shop? If it's local you walk - that's the beauty of local shops.

I agree Inimitable - far too many children have been ferried everywhere from birth. No wonder they are constantly 'shattered' and incapable of 10 minutes walk (although I know that there are also plenty of parents for whom a 10 minute walk is too much)

SoupDragon · 06/09/2015 10:09

All so a little Englander can be encouraged to think they own the parcel of road outside their home

Well, no, I suspect it was so that selfish lazy wankers don't Think they can park wherever and however they please. Which is what appears to happen with a significant minority of school run drivers.

Presumably if you're driving to a local shop you park a 10 min walk away. To do otherwise would make you a hypocrite.

This makes no sense whatsoever.

Collaborate · 06/09/2015 10:16

But I can park wherever and however I please as long as it's within the law. I don't put it to a vote. Anyone who wants to have anything to say about the choice I make is just an arse.

It makes no sense to park 10 mins from a shop, yet you expect others to park 10 mins away from a school?

Hypocrite:

(1) A person who engages in the same behaviors he condemns others for.

(2) A person who professes certain ideals, but fails to live up to them.

(3) A person who holds other people to higher standards than he holds himself.

My son lives a 5 min walk from his school. He walks. My daughter lives 2.5 miles from her school. She gets a lift or takes the bus.

My nearest local shop is 1.5 miles away. But if I choose to drive 200 yards it's no business of yours or anyone else's.

SoupDragon · 06/09/2015 10:23

But I can park wherever and however I please as long as it's within the law.

Well, you can but can and should are not the same thing at all. It is perfectly possibly to park within the law and still park like a total inconsiderate arse.

Anyone who wants to have anything to say about the choice I make is just an arse.

Not at all. If you park like an arse it would be you who is the arse. You should park with consideration to other road users, not just the letter of the law.

Collaborate · 06/09/2015 10:25

That's where we differ. If I block your driveway, I'm parking like an arse. If I park legally and don't block anyone I'm not. Then you become the arse for wanting to claim that spot on the road for yourself.

SanityClause · 06/09/2015 10:32

There have been times that I have needed to park close to the school, particularly for pickups, where we are going on elsewhere (to pick up slightly older DC from another school, 4 miles away, for example, or to go straight on to a club).

I have always assumed that others doing similar have their own reasons for needing to park close by, rather than assuming that every other parent parking close to the school is doing so because they believe their child is a precious snowflake that can't walk for 10 mins.

987flowers · 06/09/2015 10:51

I'd love to be able to walk my children to school everyday but unfortunately I have to work and only just have time to drop them off and get to where I need to on time.

I think it's all got silly, if people only parked when necessary and for a few mins before and after the school bell it wouldn't be an issue and surely residents would be able to put up with it for 2 x 15 minute slots a day (although I realise this will never happen!)

Collaborate · 06/09/2015 10:59

surely residents would be able to put up with it for 2 x 15 minute slots a day

You'd think so wouldn't you?

Collaborate · 06/09/2015 11:00

Actually, my neighbour, who always moans about school traffic (gets short shrift from me!), is always in work anyway when it's the school run.

MythicalKings · 06/09/2015 11:11

I don't think anyone minds the drop and run parents.

Squatting for up to 30 minutes in a restricted area, knowing that you are inconveniencing residents, is the behaviour of inconsiderate wankers.

Andrewofgg · 06/09/2015 11:14

But it never is 2 x 15m slots. This little snowflake has to go back for his gym kit; this one forgot to mention the rehearsal for the play; this one's parent wants to talk to the teachers or the other parents; that one's parent has been somewhere else and it wasn't worth going home.

Meanwhile this resident also has a school run to do; that one has just come back from work; and that one . . .. whatever - they all expect to get on and off their drives and not to find the road blocked. Selfish of them, I know, because the School Run Comes First.

Not that I ever lived near a school!

MidniteScribbler · 06/09/2015 11:17

That's where we differ. If I block your driveway, I'm parking like an arse. If I park legally and don't block anyone I'm not. Then you become the arse for wanting to claim that spot on the road for yourself.

No, if you have a driveway but you insist on parking in front of your neighbours house despite knowing she has two toddlers and a bung knee then that makes you an arse. One behaving legally, but still an arse.

JacquesHammer · 06/09/2015 11:30

far too many children have been ferried everywhere from birth

Actually for some people - like us - there is a genuine reason why we drive to school. We didn't get the school we were in catchment for for DD. We appealed (it was the only school we were in catchment for) and didn't get it. We got given a school that is 1 hr 9 minutes walk away (just google mapped it!). We weren't happy with that school and chose another school - also outside walking distance for a primary school child.

It simply isn't possible for DD to walk to school - too far and no public transport. So yes. I drive. But I make VERY sure I never park to inconvenience a resident. And if that means parking further away from school and walking the last bit of the way we do.

I would have LOVED DD to have walked to the local school every day. Best laid plans and all that

XCChamps · 06/09/2015 11:34

Actually my suggestion of closing the road (which I did say needed some work on a practical basis) has nothing to do with the effect of inconsiderate parking on residents, but the health, safety and,welfare children.

The way parents in cars behave outside schools is dangerous, polution levels are higher than generally in town because of the engines being left running and children on the whole do need more exercise.

SirChenjin · 06/09/2015 11:43

If I block your driveway, I'm parking like an arse. If I park legally and don't block anyone I'm not.

You're conflating the 2 there. Blocking someone's driveway is not illegal providing their car is not on their driveway, ie you are not preventing them from entering the highway (but of course, you are blocking their driveway). So you see, it's perfectly possible to be within the law and an arsehole, using your example which perfectly illustrates that - and which supports what others have already said.

Jacque - you've taken that quote out of context. I was talking about children who were incapable of walking for 10 minutes as a result of being ferried everywhere from birth. Of course there are parents who have to drive due to distance.

Andrewofgg · 06/09/2015 13:16

XCChamps Your plan is just not practicable, is it? You would not want your road closed twice a day - no matter how good it would be for the health of the nation!