Motordom

Dominion, Volume 29, Issue 303, 18 September 1936, Page 15

Motordom

by

Chassis

PARKING DIFFICULTIES IN WELLINGTON

How Civic Authorities And Motorists Can Assist

Wellington has peculiar parking problems compared with other centres, and the causes of not a few rest on the motorists themselves. For instance, while there is m uch to commend the angle parking system in Lambton Quay, tlie abuse of the system has a marked tendency to cause congestion and danger. Sooner or later the traffic control authorities must take some educative action.

Far too many motorists permit their vehicles to occupy more of the road space than is actually necessary. That Is applicable in all parts of the city. Where this form of selfishness and thoughtlessness is practised with parallel parking, it is obvious that someone else must go somewhere else for a parking place. No motorist has the right so to leave his car that it occupies the space of two cars. True it is that, because of the indifference of motorists toward the convenience of others, the only place one can find to leave one’s car is In one’s will. It is the duty of thoughtful, considerate drivers to head into or reverse into, a parking space so that they allow say, four feet, in front for emergence. Three feet are enough if every driver complied with this rule of courtesy. But the position is that many drivers have learned that if they do not provide a big gap in front they will never get out because of the close-up parking of a car behind. How many motorists have returned to their cars and found that a car has been parked with its front bumper up against the rear of the car ahead? When a string of cars are left like that, there is plenty of trouble. The fault lies with the drivers. As with speed, horn-sounding, signalling and other driving factors, parking troubles are mainly traceable to general neglect, discourtesy, and bad motoring habits. And that is the position in Lambton Quay where under the angle system of parking, long and short cars are left yards out from the gutter to such an extent that passing traffic is impeded, particularly when trams, mostly travelling briskly,’ if not too fast sometimes, are passing. In this area, opposite the Public Trust Office, there is much backing and filling, and the double-banking of cars, and to say that there is danger in the busy late afternoon is putting it mildly. Added to other indiscretions is the habit of drivers of barging right out into the traffic stream.

If two o r three traffic officers care to patrol the area mentioned between five and six o'clock each afternoon, they will find plenty to do. At any rate, the roadway is marked for the guidance of motorists parking on an angle. It is the duty of the civic authorities to keep the guiding lines painted, and motorists who disregard the clearly-defined marking deserve to be told about it.

On the general question of parking, there is no doubt that the authorities could do a great deal to alleviate the position. That could be done by the provision of more-unlimited time parking places in thoroughfares, using, where possible, the angle system on one side only. Taranaki Street below Courtenay Place is wide enough for angle parking, for instance. Mercer Street, below Victoria Street, is another thoroughfare where unlimited time parking would not cause embarrassment. The position is that motorists who have shopping or other business to do in the main thoroughfare will not park their cars in streets far removed from that main thoroughfare because there is a time limit in those streets.. Time will be lost in getting there and back so they park their cars in the main street and take the risk, thus causing congestion and other trouble. It does not seem to occur to the traffic administration that the more cars that can be parked away the less congestion there will be in the main thoroughfares. Every car in circulation is just another vehicle to be contended with, yet the ceaseless job goes on of enforcing time limits in streets which should not be subject to limits. The motorists are forced to move on, and they do move on. If the traffic administration cared to carry out a check it would obtain impressive figures of the extent to which cars are parked by the hour in different places each day. The motorists, unable to find all-day parking areas, comply with the by-laws by keeping on the move at the end of each hour. The system which compels this shifting about is not traffic control. The space occupied by one car will be taken by another immediately afterward so that the shifting of cars becomes like a game of draughts One motorist is unfortunate enough to have his wheel chalked, the inspector returns on Jiis beat an hour after, the car has gone, and another has taken its place. It has no chalk ou a wheel. The inspector may not pass that way again that day and the second car owner is lucky. Is that sort of business dignified by the name of traffic control? One does not blame the traffic inspectors who are as reasonable and tolerant a band as will be found anywhere. It is the system, this time, which is at fault.