A row over parking in a residential South Bristol street took a new twist this week with some residents putting up their own signs making it clear they weren’t responsible for the signs that caused controversy.
People living in the street in Bedminster have reacted after one resident living there stuck typed and printed up signs on the windscreens of several vehicles, saying that because the owners of those vehicles didn’t live in the street, they shouldn’t park there.
One resident said they found the signs ‘a bit sinister’, and wondered how the sign-maker knew where the owners of each car lived, but since then, more residents have come forward to oppose the notes.
Read next: 'Sinister' notes left on windscreens as parking row erupts again
The presence of the notes made headlines across the country earlier this week. The signs read: “The residents of British Road have noticed that you park on this street regularly, yet do not live on the street. Please be mindful of the residents who wish to park near their own properties. We respectfully ask you to park your vehicle on the street that you live on in future.”
At the time, one resident spoke to Bristol Live and said whoever had stuck the notes to the vehicles were not speaking on behalf of them.
And on Thursday (March 9) there was a new twist. In the window of one of the terraced homes in British Road close to where the notes were stuck on the cars, a new sign had been posted in the front window. It simply read: “FYI It’s NOT us leaving the notes on cars!” The owner of one of the vehicles that had a sign stuck to its windscreen had moved it, but another sign was still there - albeit, it had been almost entirely ripped off.
Other residents of British Road echoed the view that the note-leaver did not speak for them, although they did point out that the notes showed just how bad the parking situation had got in this part of Bedminster.
Andrew Cockerill said when he owned a car, he would often have to park two or three streets away because there were now spaces near his home. “Many households around here have more than one car and sometimes three!” he said. “The people complaining don't represent me as I know how difficult it is! Some houses have their front gardens converted for parking which removes several parking spots even when they're away!” he told Bristol Live.
“Residential parking permits are NOT the answer as it won't guarantee you a space and you'll be paying for something that you already get for free! Also it would be an extra cost when you have trades people in or visitors! Finally, you have NO right to park outside your house or in your own street so some people just have too much time on their hands if they're following people around to see where they live!”
Another British Road resident, Hannah Price, sympathised with the problems caused for people who need to park close to their homes. “I live in British Road, it is a joke,” she told Bristol Live’s Facebook page. “We can see people from Royal Mail park here, peoplel off to work, people just going shopping. When you have to bring in a week's worth of shopping and then have to go find a space which is sometimes on the other side of the park (it) is a total joke,” she added.
Bristol Live has reported several times on the parking issues in this part of Bedminster. It is a warren of narrow Victorian streets that lie just outside the Southville Residents Parking Zone, is close enough to the city centre for commuters to park up for free each day and either walk or get the bus in to the city, and it’s on the route of the main Airport Bus, so the streets are used as a free park and ride car park for people going on holiday.
Kimberley Keenan sympathised with the resident who printed out the signs. “I live in a street with the same situation,” she told Bristol Live’s Facebook page. “There is no residential parking scheme, more houses going up by the minute and no parking for them. And a high street with 2hr restrictions in busy times. We always have the shop workers park in our road and I can spend 40 minutes or more trying to find a space. We have to live with it as it is a public road and don’t have any right over the spaces,” she added.
Many saw both sides of the debate. Nicholas Helps said: “I empathise with both sides of this argument…. where I do object is where a minority of drivers mix up ‘parking’ with ‘storage’.
“We recently couldn’t park outside our house due to an unknown driver (not a neighbour), parking a battered 30-year-old motorhome outside the gate for a month without moving it. Due to muppets like this the council are implementing a parking control scheme in a few months time, which ultimately will pass the cost back to residents via a permit scheme,” he added.
But most readers pointed out that people have no rights over the road in front of their home, and if they wanted a guarantee of being able to park right outside their home, they should live in a house with its own drive.
“People do get weirdly possessive about parking spaces,” said Dan Post. “There's something about parking spaces that turns what are usually polite, civilised human beings into entitled, mouth breathing cretins.”
Read more on Bedminster's parking nightmares:
- Fed-up residents make own double yellow lines in protest at pavement parking
- Two-up-two-down terraced home being turned into 7 bed HMO is 'appalling'
- 'Liveable neighbourhood' proposed for South Bristol to reduce rat runs
- Slow down to save South Bristol's surprising new otter population, drivers told
- Calls for new parking zones for Bedminster and Ashton Gate
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