28 July (Part 1) - Shameless Councils design road traps and rake in their ill-gotten gains
Web statistics indicate that there is nothing BiB readers like more than
stories about Councils ripping off motorists and here’s another one. I was in
East Ham yesterday installing a second CCTV camera in the old lady’s house but
work came to a halt when I discovered I’d left the network cable
crimping tool at home. As a result I left a few minutes after five. My aunt had already
told me it was almost bedtime so it was time to go anyway.
She lives near the border with Barking so the easiest way out of town is via the
North Circular and from there down to Beckton. From Beckton I can see home
but as you know, thanks to Teresa O’Neill putting her ward before the rest of
the borough… but let’s not go into that again.
The
route on to the North Circular is dreadful at the best of times. Newham’s drivers
appear to have learned their skill from watching too many Bollywood movies. No
one indicates the direction they plan on heading for. Lane discipline. What’s that?
Yesterday I found myself on the outside lane in the bottom left quadrant of the
associated Google Earth image and indicating right. (Click for a much larger
view.) A bus was occupying the adjacent lane to my left.
The yellow box ahead was full of stationary and slow moving vehicles facing almost
every conceivable angle. As they slowly managed to get on to the northbound North
Circular (top left exit on picture) more came in from Barking (lower right quadrant) to take their
place. No one made any attempt to observe the yellow box rules. I simply sat there waiting while being honked vigorously from behind.
There was not only no clear exit from the yellow box there was not even a clear entry into it.
Eventually there was a short lived clear path to the other side and I went for
it. So did the bus driver who wasn't very interested in remaining in the Barking
lane (to the east) and squeezed me in my southbound lane. In my very small car I
just managed to keep moving with an inch or so clear of his right flank.
That roundabout is a nightmare for drivers but not perhaps for Newham Council.
In
the edition of their fortnightly magazine (how do they get away with that and
have the lowest Council Tax rate in Outer London) that hit doormats in the first
week of June a page was devoted to Yellow Box Junctions.
It revealed that since January this year they had issued 8,995 penalty charge
notices for Yellow Box Junctions. (Click image for the whole article.)
Bearing in mind press dates etc. that must be in less than five months and probably only four.
2,250 PCNs a month. That’s 27,000 a year or £3,510,000 at the
pre-discount rate.
Sooner or later there will be a rebellion in this country caused wholly by bad
governance and corrupt politicians.