car-parks and exits

Honest John Back Room » Motoring discussion
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Sat 19 Oct 2002 14:30
car-parks and exits - Rita
Yesterday parked in an open-air Council car park. On leaving by the only exit I realised that I would have to traverse a heavy metal base plate with a row of raised teeth shaped rather like the Thames Barrier (the three centre teeth were down).
I gingerly started to cross, realised that the teeth did not seems to be depressing – the graunchy noise of metal on metal was a dead give away - and on the basis that I hadn’t reached the point of no return backed off ever so slowly into the car park.

I then parked in an area where I could see the silhouette of the next dozen or so cars exiting. Some cars just cleared the upright teeth; others scraped the entire underneath of their vehicles whilst lurching from side to side. The noise on some of the cars was horrendous.

Ho hum, I thought, now what Pondered, then made my escape by different means.

Subsequently phoned the Council Parking Department and explained the situation. I enquired if their Public Liability insurance was up to date as they may be heading for a number of damage claims. Concern was shown particularly when I suggested that metal teeth, ruptured petrol tanks and sparks was not a desirable scenario. Action was promised ‘this day’. I await the outcome.

One thing that puzzled me was what was the function of this contraption other than to rip one’s tyres to shreds if one entered the park by the exit. The lady in the Parking Dept. didn’t know either. Possibly it is a relic of a previous parking system.

Rita

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Sat 19 Oct 2002 15:09
car-parks and exits - Tom Shaw
Councils seem to take a delight nowadays in installing devices which will damage vehicles rather than just prevent them from taking a particular route. Todays Telegraph has a story about a bollard in Durham which lowers into the ground to allow a vehicle through after the driver has paid the toll to exit the city centre. Apparantly it sprang up through the underside of a car whose driver tail-gated another through the toll to avoid the fee. Serves him right, you may think, but it says more about the attiude of some of the weirdo's who inhabit local government than the poor guy who was as sick as the rest of us about being robbed blind to persue his motoring.
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Sat 19 Oct 2002 15:45
car-parks and exits - The Watcher
Sounds like the council have turned the entrance and exit routes around but failed to remove the teeth you mention.

The teeth are usually to stop people trying to drive out of the entrance without paying.

have you car checked very carefully and present the council with the bill for any damage.
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