When Chris and June Lumley’s latest newsletter went out , a copy went through the letterbox of Geoff Percival. He’s the Evening Echo’s political reporter and he lives in Grange Ward.
Mr Percival clearly decided to make a story out of it. He didn’t write about how they are still working hard through the summer holidays. Instead he wrote about something they included about car parking:
It has pretty shrill headlines. “COUNCILLORS SAY YELLOW LINES MERCHANTS DESERVE A TICKET.” “MOTORISTS URGED TO SHOP ILLEGAL PARKERS”
Well, this is what they actually wrote:
Parking at Grange Shopping Parade
We have had complaints that cars are sometimes parking on the double yellow lines on the corners of the roads. This is inconsiderate because these were put in to keep the drop kerbs clear for people such as mothers with prams to get onto the pavement.
Traffic enforcement officers don?t normally patrol this far from the town centre, but they are mobile, and if an infringement is reported they will come down in a van, and issue a ticket.
The number to ring is 01702 318026.
The point about this is that if residents are concerned about cars blocking the drop kerbs for a long period , it’s no use them expecting the District Council staff to spot it , because they don’t normally patrol there. Somebody needs to phone them. And a phone call to the council isn’t going to ‘shop’ anybody only parked there for a few minutes – because once a resident has seen them, decided to complain, walked home and found the phone number, they are going to be gone aren’t they?