Have zero sympathy for parents for parents being fined for breaking parking rules outside schools

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https://www.leicestermercury.co.uk/news/local-news/parents-slam-school-parking-madness-10674874?utm_source=mynewsassistant.com&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=embedded_search_item_desktop

Parents are moaning about CoL with fines parking on double yellow, zig zags etc.

One stupid quote from a parent
"I don’t understand why the fines are being handed out anyway. For those who park up more than 30 minutes at a time, fair enough they should be fined but for those who park for 10 minutes there needs to be more understanding."
"Times are hard as it is anyway and adding that extra expense of the ticket, on top of living costs rising is just unnecessary. Its putting more pressure on parents. The money I spent on that fine could be spent on putting a smile on my child’s face."

Well if you read the Highway Code, leave a few minutes earlier and get your DC to walk either from home or park down a side street (not on parking restricted lines/bays) about 5 min walk from the school, you won't risk getting a fine.

No sympathy from me.

I believe the removing the boundaries for parents to apply for their DC to attend schools outside catchment areas isn't doing this any favours. In the old days when I was at school, if you wanted your DC to attend a certain school, you moved home.

Also what are the chances are these parents are driving newish (less than 3 years old) cars that cost them £50k?

there needs to be a safe parking option available around schools

unless the parking option is literally in front of the school gate, it's never going to be acceptable for all these lazy parents.

Parking for work is usually 8+ hours; school parking is for pick up only. Walk or park safely.

One mum at my DC's old primary school lived literally 300 yards from the school entrance.

Absolutely no mobility issues whatsoever for the child or parent.

That mum DROVE their child to school. Every. Single. Day. 🙄

There are too many lazy people about nowadays.

It is time to start clamping the cars, and if necessary, taking them away to be crushed. Unfortunately I think that is what it will take to get the message out there.

I used to drive my kids to primary school as it was a 2 mile walk along country lanes with no pavement. However a lot more recently a neighbour walks her kid to the same school by a much shorter route - a mile straight across the fields, rain or shine!

We also for some reason seem to have lots of cars on trade plates. Amazingly how many cars are being what test driven by mechanics at school drop offs.

And the local car parts van. Plenty of make arsehole parking at our school.

@myheadsjustmush bet they were always still late too😂

They need to make blue badge applications easier for those who need them. I am currently going through EBSA with DS and I can't physically manhandle him "several streets" to school. This is required on bad days. Try surfboarding a ten year old any distance. School have suggested a blue badge but the website is awful and I'm used to filling in paperwork. I'm not saying I support illegal parking but can see why people who ae desperate do it.

I'm a childminder and have been doing the 'school runs ' to our local primary school for over 25 years.
I could write a book about what I've witnessed there, I've seen it all,from parents parking on the zebra crossing, to the downright nasty side of it with parents verbally abusing residents .
Over the past few years, it's got worse- people don't give a shit about others,and are very selfish and entitled. I'm actually giving up the school runs next year and this is part of the reason.

Won’t school let you drop/briefly park in their staff carpark?

That’s what most reasonable schools do for children who require additional help getting to and from.

I have real shadenfreude when I see people with parking tickets. I can't stand dickheads who park illegally.

In my town and the place I work, the council allows free parking in town car parks no more than 5 minutes walk from the schools… they allow onsite permits for families with mobility issues etc.

you still get people parking dangerously, blocking pavements, double yellows and disrupting local businesses, they give you abuse if you ask them to leave our customer car park free for customers.

our council are now bringing in no traffic zones with ANPR. It does mean our staff and customers will need to log their number plates on arrival.

Usually I'm the first to agree with this sort of sentiment but here, no.

At our school loads of dads do school runs. Like, close to 50/50. There are lots of grandparents too and probably about a third of those are grandfathers. The terribly dangerous parking is done by both men and women. It's terribly dangerous no matter who is doing it.

I also disagree that schools should have parking near. I mean firstly it's impossible unless you're building a new school. Most schools are in residential areas, there would be no way to suddenly create additional car parking nearby anyway. Secondly we should be encouraging other ways of travel not cars. Thirdly your comment about workplaces I also don't agree, absolutely loads of workplaces don't have good parking options nearby! I work in the NHS and my employer has very limited employee permit parking, the waiting list for a permit is literally years and years long. The closest parking option otherwise is a city centre based multistorey that is about 20 mins walk way and costs a fair bit. Many primary school aged children in inner city areas live less than 20 mins walk from their school anyway.

Car Parks built near schools would be empty pretty much all day, it'd be an incredible waste of land. People just need to tell their kids to walk or cycle to school. Or get the bus. Or find a nearer school. Or move closer to the existing school.

Most American kids take school busses to and from school. When I was a kid my parents very rarely drove me to school. Bussing is the norm here.

It's the same here (I'm in Australia not city just suburbia but it's growing like nothing else) we live about 200m from my sons primary school (he is in high school now) and they park like twats we have a parking lane up and down the street and most parents park there but many park over driveways in the kiss and ride section which is like 5 metres from a corner so holds up buses and other cars so many near misses and the buses can hardly get around the corners with cars parked everywhere (it's a single lane road) and if people are driving the other way i seriously feel like buses scrape cars sometimes.
Some parents have so much entitlement it's crazy and they even start lining up at 1:30pm even though school doesn't finish til 3:10 I just wish I had that much free time to sit in the car.

My DD goes to a school where there's not enough parking. A resident complains once in a while & they put up more no parking signs, but no alternative options. The school keeps campaigning for more students (even though it's already full). There's no public transport & it's too far to walk.

We did campaign, fundraise, and manage to build a new carpark in the grounds. New principal decided it would be a staff carpark. It's about 1/3 full at pickup but us lowly parents aren't allowed to use it.

So there are sometimes reasons people park illegally. Where I park, if desperate l, it affects no one, as it's at a dead end and no through traffic. But our council has a new camera car to sweep past, issue fines remotely & do nothing to fix the situation. I've told DH I'll get a fine at some point & just have to wear it as there's no option.

No sympathy here. I wish they’d come around by us more often. They might even catch the gaggle of parents who say an extra 20 min. Last week they were stood chatting in the roads i had to drive around then. It was ridiculous!

I live in a similar situation but it's a railway station not a school, thet repainted the double yellow lines but still people park like it's a car park and many adults are dropped off and collected as they equally may melt in the rain! Their selfishness when some of these adults could just park a little down the road and the commuters walk a bit like 30 seconds means that at busy times of day the residents are trapped if it was a fire or an ambulance needed to drive down here it is not happening as I have already seen my neighbour's as ambulance not being able to pass!

With the school run I once saw three parents physically stop a parent parking on the zig zags outside the school by standing on them!!

Where is the closest place you can park legally and walk?

Same here! Especially with BMWs and those with personal plates!

Noticed in general, both driving and parking, the fewer characters on the personal plates, the bigger the idiot. Drove behind a car with plate like JW 2!

How far is too far to walk? Most primary schools, unless very rural are walkable.

https://www.gov.uk/trade-licence-plates/rules

In particular

You can only use the plates for the purpose you write on your application form. For example, if you say they’ll be used for customers to test drive vehicles for sale, they cannot be used for other purposes.

Hi, you can report the misuse of trade plates by emailing [email protected]. Please include the nature of misuse and any trade plate number used. A warning letter will then be sent to the registered holder of the trade plate.

We've had to get our street changed to residents parking only, because of it all.

This is exactly the middle class entitled attitude I was talking about and it's cropping up with increasing frequency. If you don't want anyone driving or parking on your street you should take over the costs of maintaining it from the local authority. Why on earth are taxpayers required to fund what is now essentially your own private car park? These schemes aren't without set-up costs either - well over £10k for the consultation, planning etc not to mention ongoing enforcement. So that's been added to everyone's already massive council tax bill. Just so you don't have to look at cars on your street for 15 minutes twice a day, for 188 days a year.

Plus it does nothing to actually square the circle of inflexible school/work start times, shitty national public transport provision, cripplingly expensive or inadequate or non-existent wraparound care etc while schools just wag their hands around and tell people to walk.

Recently knocked on the window of the car of a Mum parked up. Offered her reading lessons, cue puzzled look. I pointed to the sign "Parking here endangers children's lives". She shrugged. Oh for a traffic warden.....

Who are these 4% who YABU? Probably those self entitled lazy parents we detest