To ignore the school parking diktat?

[Ginmakesitallok]

I drive to drop off andpick kids up from school - too far to walk and on my way to work. Its busy, but i usually get a space in the street beside school.

Theres a note in a recent school newsletter to say that parents shouldn't drive into this street, that there's no parking for parents there and that the yellow lines are for kids safety.

Now - it's a public road, no restricted parking, only yellow lines are at junctions where I'd never park. Surely the school can't think that it can stop parents parking where they want if they are parking legally??

seem to think that only they can park on their street though and don't seem to get the fact that everyone has as much right to park there as they do.

Lots of people down my old street seemed to think they had as much as much right as residents to park there (and leave their car all day because they were too lazy to walk to the station). Now it's resident parking only and they have no right at all to park there. It wouldn't need to happen if people thought about what was considerate rather than what was legal.

it isn't illegal to drive children to school but it is morally wrong, if they are able to walk there. Not only very bad for the children, but millions upon millions of silly pointless little journeys every day are destroying the whole planet.

It's legal to park outside my house. It does, however, completely block my vision in both directions, meaning I have to edge right out to see if it's clear, it is not a safe manoeuvre, and one day someone's going to get the front of my car.

This thread has settled something for me though, it's plain that it's never going to be resolved, so I'm going to see if I can get the double yellows extended.

Our school has this issue. No one thinks they are the problem. As a result, there have been some fairly serious near misses at the school and surrounding streets. Also residents of the surrounding streets get blocked in their drives constantly. This is about kids safety, your kids too. You should park further away if you can. People who park dangerously or in considerately around schools are risking the safety of all the kids and the parents who get off their arses and walk to school. It's a no brainer to me. The school are asking parents to be more considerate for the sake of the kids, that includes your kids. You should support them in what they are trying to achieve instead of deliberately ignoring it because you don't want to walk a bit further.

Ive also seen one mother arrested for parking on the zig zags, well thats what it started as.....repetedly told not too, even by police. She refused to stop doing it coz she didnt want to get out the car and walk the kids in.

One day police asked her to move, she refused and then got out the car and broke the copper nose, but she was still ranging that she was perfectly entitled to park where ever she pleased....ok it is twatty parking but its a funny story.

Its the entitlement issue.....it may or may not be you causing the parking issue, but its the whole "me me me i can do what i want" and i dont understand the reason behind the thread, you ask if your being UR, and disagree with majority because "its your right" vecause your the most considerate and safest driver ever....you cant know that your not causing an issue

Yep Crips, the 6th formers all park round here too, not enough parking. The school has loads of land, they've got a good acre laid down as a veg plot that's not even bothered with, they should turn it into more parking for the 6th form and a parent's car park

Yeah we have this problem at my dc school. Parents blocking residents in residents complaining
On one occasion an ambulance couldn't get to one residents home and so now we have police patrolling the area handing out tickets and warning people
It's difficult but the only answer is to park further away safely considerately and legally

Our road has no school parking in it. People still do. Kid almost got run over a few weeks ago, as childminder came round corner too quickly while he was crossing. Very upsetting to see. She still parks on the road, doesn't give a shit.

I have already nearly ran a child over there, they were on a scooter and old enough to know better. I was going as slow as I could thank God. I live on the road so I have to drive on it, but all the other cars parked on there blocked my view of him, and him of me.

It makes a very residential road very dangerous twice a day. My toddler is mostly well behaved but will sometimes do something silly, it could easily end in tragedy.

I'd ignore the plea too tbh. Parking is a nightmare around any school and we park on surrounding streets that have legal parking. We get the odd pcso do the rounds to tell people off for parking up on kerbs as we've had a few complaints about that. The parents that really annoy me are the ones that have the audacity to park ON people's drives. I mean wtaf??? We have a couple of those parents at our school and even after getting a good bollocking they still do it. But parking legally on a nearby road is not for the school to dictate but only advise.

It's the public highway, its safe and legal. There is no issue.

If you don't want to see cars on your road, take it into private ownership, put a gate on it, issue a key/ password to immediate neighbours and tarmac it yourself.

If you're not prepared to do that - if you expect taxpayers to pay for the upkeep of the road outside your house - then you must also expect car drivers who are driving legally, to use the road near your house.

It is insanity to imagine that you have a right to not be inconvenienced by other people living in the same world as you. It's like complaining about other commuters using the trains. Mad.

Parents are only parked for 5-10 mins twice a day for drop offs and pick ups.

Charlottelouisa:

First, that's not always right. Parents sometimes want to talk to teachers or other parents, or the children are having a natter and they don't want to stop them.

And second, if that five or ten minutes is when you want to get off or onto your own drive safely it's five or ten minutes too long. And everyone who lives near a school has seen drives blocked - or even parked on - by the sort of parent who thinks "it will only be a moment so it doesn't matter" - yes it bloody does!

No, residents don't own the road, but they do have the right to use it. And if it takes a CPZ and a ticket-happy commission-driven attendant for them to do that, so be it.

Why do people equate using the public highway the way it is legal and safe to use it, with parking on zig zags and yellow lines and causing obstructions on the public highway by blocking people's drives etc.?

They are 2 totally different behaviours.

One is normal, reasonable and perfectly OK (unless you think it's hopelessly selfish and anti-social to own cars because climate change, environment etc., which is a valid view but a different argument), the other is anti-social, selfish and should have much stronger penalties attached.

I don't understand why the two are equated tbh.

Yes it may be legal but I doubt the residents enjoy feeling like they live in a NCP for 2 hours a day. Can you imagine the noise it brings, not only from the cars but from slamming doors, kids yelling, and also the pollution. I can't imagine anything worse. The residents have obviously complained - to you it's a street where you leave your car for probably half an hour a day. For them - it's their home.

FrancisCrawford I repeat- I didn't say anything about asking a complete stranger if they were disabled. I asked if you would ask anybody That includes people you know. I presume that you wouldn't as that would be quite rude whether or not you know them. It wasn't a "peculiar question" . I was just trying to make the point that you don't necessarily know how far people can walk whether or not you have known them for decades. Even if they say they are just too lazy it may be that they don't want to talk about the real issues and don't see why they should have to explain themselves.

I'm not invested at all in the specific issue of whether people park near schools- that particular issue doesn't affect me. I am just irritated by the attitude of many people that no one but them is allowed to park on the street they live in and others should all walk rather than drive. Even if it is a fairly short distance, not everyone can walk it and you don't always know who those people are, even if you think you do.

Yes keeping doing it, you are clearly the special one that does have to follow the rules that have been put into place for the children's safety

We have a school at the end of our road. The way parents park is unbelievable, across drives, so far up on pavements that I can't walk past and have to take my small children on the road which is full of other parents trying to get as close as possible and driving like d@#ks. It isn't just 10 minutes either, parent start parking upto an hour before school ends.

If people parked properly and spread out over the roads nearby and walked a couple of minutes then there would be no issue.

Twoleft - what rules? The school can't just make up rules! I follow the highway code, I've never parked across a drive, or on yellow lines or inconsiderately.

At one point I had to park across my own drive, with a laminated note in the window explaining, when I left for work in the morning to make sure DW could get out later. Mercifully that school closed, but it elft me with stron views about this subject.

AskBasil this is about safety not inconvenience. It seems that is an easy get out clause through process for those who know they are causing difficulties.

Near the end of last term, I was forced to take my double buggy off the pavement and on to the busy road at school pick up time. Because someone had parked very far on to the kerb on bin day.

When I took my buggy out on to the road, she actually rolled down her window to yell at me because 'she was just about to move' so she stopped me on this busy road with my twin babies to throw abuse at me because I couldn't get by because of her bad parking. She couldn't understand that she was obstructing the pavement and somehow made this my fault!

All the while she was shouting at me, she was also reversing and not looking, she almost hit my 6 year old and his friend, and his mum. She DID hit another mum with a buggy, but she didn't see any of that because she was looking and shouting at me.

What people have said is right, it's the entitled behaviour, it quickly escalates and gets out of control. Cars should not be parked obstructing a public footpath, they should not block roads or park across driveways or on blind bends. They should not park on zig zags or lines.

If everyone parked considerately, the school wouldn't need to put out a letter.

The school are protecting your kids!

Don't forget, no one thinks they are the problem, it's everyone else. That is not the case, anyone who takes a car to school, no matter the reason, is contributing to the problem and should behave in away that doesn't put anyone else in danger or prevent emergency vehicles getting in or out.

Don't forget, no one thinks they are the problem, it's everyone else.

That's right. Zigzags mean "reserved for me to drop my special snowflake on", don't they?

but why should I

The motto of arseholes the world over.

This.

But the OP has made clear that she does park considerately, safely and legally.

Unless you think "inconsiderate" means "in my road where I can see your car irritatingly parked legally and safely".

We don't know it's about safety, because the school hasn't said that. It is far more likely to be about resident relationships, as if it were about safety the school would be working with the community wardens and the highways department to get lines and other parking restrictions in (eg, my kids' school has no parking at all Mon-Fri before 6PM, in the roads near the school - but if you go a bit further on, you're allowed to park for two hours. So you can be relatively flexible about parking rules, discouraging unsafe parking without inconveniencing residents).

Some people really seem to think that Andrew... even when we've had the police up at the school moving people along, a guy parked on the zig zags, policeman told him he had to move and he said 'but I'm only dropping off, it's raining'

Well that's ok then, you go right ahead and block the road completely so that no one else can get by in either direction (because the other side of the road is full or parents parked cars!)

Total knob!