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Flowchart here www.parkingandtrafficappeals.gov.uk/appeal_bus_lan...m explains the appeals process. Nothing to stop you making informal representations to TfL or the Council in the meantime.
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I think the appeal is a given. It's whether it is acceptable to enter a buslane for the reason given that seems to be the problem. Thanks for yor input so far.
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PU will be your man, but I'd guess at
No, it is not acceptable to enter a buslane for matters of convenience.
I should think it would have to be an emergency for it to be justified.
Still, mitigation is a wonderful thing if used correctly.
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From the online Highway Code:
Bus and tram lanes. These are shown by road markings and signs. You MUST NOT drive or stop in a tram lane or in a bus lane during its period of operation unless the signs indicate you may do so.
Law RTRA sects 5 & 8
And:
You MUST NOT overtake ...
..if you would have to enter a lane reserved for buses, trams or cycles during its hours of operation ...
Legs to stand on = 0???? Harsh, and his actions probably reduced congestion / wasted time and fuel, but the law is not best known for its flexibility!
This is perhaps a case where an exception should be stated though - eg for double white lines, it is acceptable to cross to enter a turning, or to pass another vehicle doing less than 10 mph.
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RichardW
Is it illogical? It must be Citroen....
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Sorry to digress, but...
>for double white lines, it is acceptable to cross to enter a turning, or to pass another vehicle doing less than 10 mph.
Only if the "other vehicle" is completely staionary, or is a pedal cycle, agricultural vehicle or horse. For example it's not OK for a motorcyclist to overtake a queue of stationary (or snail's pace) traffic on a double white, even if it's doing much less that 10mph.
-Mark
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The problem with making an exemption to the bus lane rule for a case like this is where do you draw the line?
If it's OK to nip inside one obstructing car, what about two, or three, or ten, or fifty? At what point does it undermine the purpose of the bus lane?
It's one thing to argue that there shouldn't be a bus lane at all, but I would have thought that it would be hard work to persuade the magistrates that they should make an exception to the rule. There may well be case law already.
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I'd tend to agree with Mark and No Wheels that the use described is not allowed. There will be a bus lane order or bye law somewhere which sets out the exemptions for this lane but I think you'll find they only cover emergency, direction by a policeman etc. Does the CCTV show how long our man was held up for?, several minutes might just get him off the hook with a sympathetic adjudicator on a good day but i would not bet my shirt on it. Essentially it's a £50 punt whether he pays the discounted fine now or takes a chance on an appeal and has to pay the full whack.
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I feared as much. I shall report back once I find out how things have gone.
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No Dosh
Dig out that local Bus Lane Order and inspect with fine tooth comb.
There will be a list of exemptions, generally fringed to avoid accident, obstruction etc.
Also is it not the fact that if you get your appeal in before the fine doubles, then the lower rate is put on hold until such time as the matter is resolved.
DVD
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Ta DVD, I shall pass on your sage words. Now back to the Cotes De Rhone with you. ;o)
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Surely the issue is not whether he is entitled to use the bus lane in this way - almost certainly not, for the reasons NW advances.
The point must be that the infringement, which is evidently is, is
(a) so minor as to be utterly trivial,
(b) clearly so from the photographic evidence adduced by the Council, and
(c) self-evidently not the type of behaviour that the bus lane order was intended to prevent, i.e. the obstruction of buses on their routes.
This bus lane was presumably put in place to ease the flow of buses. Yet it is being enforcd in a way that has no effect on the flow of public transport, merely to make life harder for car users. And people wonder why no-one believes HMG and its utterances.
Another example of a disproportionate punishment meted out to a driver.
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This bus lane was presumably put in place to ease the flow of buses. Yet it is being enforcd in a way that has no effect on the flow of public transport, merely to make life harder for car users. And people wonder why no-one believes HMG and its utterances.
So here we have one case of someone who feels it's unfair to be punished for going into what I presume is a clearly-marked bus lane (most of them are as clear as daylight).
Meanwhile, stand by any street with a bus lane and watch the number of cars which use the bus lane. Without enforcement, it's usually lots -- on my route out of town, the buses often take 3 phases of traffic lights to get through the junction, purely because so many cars clog the bus lane.
The easiest and cheapest way to enforce any such rule is rigidly. Unless you are arguing for no bus lanes at all, I can't see any other way of making enforcement work, other than paying people to stand and watch every bus lane.
I have a lot of sympathy for this driver, but -- as so often happens -- this poor divil is paying the price for the misbehaviour of others.
It's like the SORN system -- a pin-in-the-neck for lots of honest folk, which wouldn't be needed if there weren't so any people trying to evade road-tax altogether.
What should be posible, though, is some reduced penalty for a situation like this. I hope the magistrates have some authority to exercise discretion.
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What should be posible, though, is some reduced penalty for a situation like this. I hope the magistrates have some authority to exercise discretion.
Why take the Magistrate's time and heaven knows how much per hour? Why not just exercise the same discretion prior to isuing the notice? (as the evidence for this is already in the pictures) Instead of "discretion", you could call it "intelligence", or "common sense" ....
I did agree that the driver was in the wrong, note. I just wonder what kind of criminal offence would justify the same fine in the same Magistrate's Courts, and what (exactly) is achieved to the benefit of society by the money spent punishing this driver.
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Why not just exercise the same discretion prior to isuing the notice?
Because it's automated system, to keep costs down. The overwhelming majority of cases will be clear-cut, so it makes more sense to let the few honest exceptions be sorted out later.
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>> Why not just exercise the same discretion prior to isuing the notice? Because it's automated system, to keep costs down. The overwhelming majority of cases will be clear-cut, so it makes more sense to let the few honest exceptions be sorted out later.
Thereby placing the burden of sorting out the system's mistakes on the innocent. I doubt you can claim your costs back from the Council.
And, if the fine is 'only' £50 then there is no way that the amount of my time required to explain the circumstances would be worth less than that, frankly. So in the end, the automated system bears down more heavily on the innocent than the guilty.
I know bus lane infringement is a minor offence to get exercised about, but Justice is not just about efficiency. It is also about fairness.
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I know bus lane infringement is a minor offence to get exercised about, but Justice is not just about efficiency. It is also about fairness.
Indeed, but it's also about balancing fairness.
Unenforced bus lanes are deeply unfair to the all those bus passengers, whose journeys are delayed by people who choose to use cars but decide they want the priority lanes too. And nobody has yet come with a better method of enforcement.
The same sort of thing applies elsewhere too. Get on a train without a ticket because you were in a hurry, and nowadays you'll get fined: no ifs, no buts. Why? Because when there was no penalty,too many ppl used to take the chance that would get away without paying fares.
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Unenforced bus lanes are deeply unfair to the all those bus passengers, whose journeys are delayed by people who choose to use cars but decide they want the priority lanes too.
In this case, which bus passengers, exactly? ;-)
And nobody has yet come with a better method of enforcement.
They should try harder. It is their job, after all.
The same sort of thing applies elsewhere too. Get on a train without a ticket because you were in a hurry, and nowadays you'll get fined
So? Take your groceries without paying because you were in a hurry and you'll be done.
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>> And nobody >> has yet come with a better method of enforcement. They should try harder. It is their job, after all.
It's the driver's job to try harder not to enter a bus lane.
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It's the driver's job to try harder not to enter a bus lane.
A quick scroll upwards would remind us that in this case there was no harm caused by doing so and no earthly reason* why he should not have done so. Indeed, by doing so he eased the flow of traffic and reduced congestion. Hello?
*Other than bureaucratic tidiness. Which says a lot about New Labour's Britain.
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Meanwhile, stand by any street with a bus lane and watch the number of cars which use the bus lane. Without enforcement, it's usually lots --
I reckon to pass 5 or six bus lanes going to and from work each day, and I'd say that on 5 of them, it is exceedingly rare to see cars on them, and on the sixth, it is not rare, but it is not commom either.
I can think of one bus lane (at 'The Saddle', known to myself and Adski, see elsewhere) that many bus drivers actually avoid. It is at a set of lights, and the bus lane has its own lights, which will normally be red, but change when a bus approaches - unfortuntely the delay caused by having to set other lights to red to put the bus lane green means it is often quicker for the buses not to bother
and don't get me started on the po-faced selfrighteous brigade sat there in the lane to the right of you who don't understand that it ceased to be a bus lane half an hour ago !
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I don't understand why that bus lane is there to be honest borasport. It probably looked good on paper but surely when they got around to the traffic light phasings they would have realised their mistake.
My suggestions for that would be turn the bus lane into an all vehicle lane - the ONLY lane going right. Make the existing car lane into another roundabout entrance (or merge it). Widen that railway bridge (which as you say - isn't going to happen) and make it so that two lanes head into the centre.
Should I apply for town planner? ;-)
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Adam
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"Should I apply for town planner?"
.....only if you like rejection. "Common sense" + "town planning" = oxymoron.
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Should I apply for town planner? ;-)
I think that the job you are looking for is that of roads planner, generally a rather different one.
My father did that job for a while in the 1980s, and in his day it seemed to involve mostly drawing big red lines through the city, where he planned to build dual carriageways.
In those days, I was much less moderate in my views about cars in the city than I am now that I have mellowed into middle-age. So our conversations at home were, ummm, free and frank.
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If common sense had prevailed when the bus lane regulations were drafted then the offence would have been stated as "impeding the progress of a bus when in a bus lane".
Result: doubling of road capacity; reduction of tail-backs from stretches with bus lanes to those without, thereby NOT holding up the bus on that section; less congestion; less pollution; etc.
Unfortunatelt common sense and traffic laws are opposites.
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If common sense had prevailed when the bus lane regulations were drafted then the offence would have been stated as "impeding the progress of a bus when in a bus lane".
But then you'd have had drivers complaining that they tried to get out of the bus lane when the bus was coming, but no-one would let them out.
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Maybe a spin-off would be that people would learn to use their mirrors.
After all, if you can't see a bus coming up behind, what hope have you of seeing anything smaller.
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Ah common sense. What a wonderful notion in these PC blighted days......
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You don't get a fine if you drive in the bus lane in Wolverhampton. You get Bus Lane Violation and your reg number flashed up on an information sign nearby.
It's supposed to shame people into not doing it, but in reality everyone just says "ooh, that's clever, lets get it to see if it can pick up my reg number too".
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Dig out that local Bus Lane Order and inspect with fine tooth comb.
Anyone care to tell me where you would find such orders, and those for parking restrictions etc.
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Pdc
Traffic Management Depart of your Local Authority/County Council.
Local Plod Station may let you see their copy if they are friendly.
DVD
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