Driving - it's not like it used to be!

Driving over the years has changed, the roads are definitely fuller, road rage is talked about, petrol isn't cheap, insurance isn't cheap!

Has it got any pluses ... I wonder!!!

Yes, of course it is great to be able to get in your car and go from 'A' to 'B' enjoy a visit to see family and friends, go to the country or seaside. Drive to the airport and get on a plane ...

Many use their cars for shopping, a little retail therapy and most are happy to leave their cars in a car park - let's face it where else would you leave it !

This story however, is no joke and similar happened to me and Eddie a few years back now when we visited a retail park ... it took us simply ages to get out of the car park and in more recent years it is something we tend to steer clear of if we can!

"Retail park shoppers fined £100 after being trapped in car park gridlock

Easter bank holiday shoppers have been hit with £100 fines after getting stuck in traffic in a gridlocked car park.

Parking cameras at the Ashford Retail Park in Kent became operational in April to aid the enforcement of a new three-hour maximum stay.

However, shoppers were trapped in heavy traffic in the car park on Easter Monday, causing them to be stuck on the site for hours as the attempted to leave.

Three weeks later, Peter Donald, from Kingsnorth, Kent, was hit with a £100 fine for exceeding the three-hour time limit.

He told the Daily Mail: "We went about our normal business. We were probably there about an hour and a half. We came out of Costa and it was absolutely gridlocked.

"My family and I were stranded in a gridlocked car park when trying to leave. We were in our car in excess of about two hours. No one was letting anyone out. There were people parking up on the main road."

Donald explained that it took them 20 minutes just to get out of their parking space.

He told the newspaper: "On Monday we received a penalty charge notice from Highview Parking who enforce the three-hour time limit on parking at this site. They must have had a flood of penalty charge notices from this day.

"What troubles me is that there's no quality control. It was utter madness. It's just a money making exercise.

"I find it rather disappointing that these companies apply no common sense or quality control to their issuing of parking fines to innocent motorists who have over stayed due to no fault of their own."

Despite the heavy traffic, he still received a penalty charge notice – which he intends to appeal."

http://www.aol.co.uk/cars/2017/05/10/retail-park-shoppers-fined-100-after-being-trapped-in-carpark-gridlock/?icid=maing-grid7%7Cmain5%7Cdl1%7Csec1_lnk3%26pLid%3D336306718_uk

Do you enjoy driving?
Have you had a similar experience?

All the best Jan

Reported in Surrey where we used to live, someone went into the McDonalds for breakfast. drove out and went to work, and went back for dinner on the way home.

They were hit with a fine for being in the car park all day.

The endless traffic jams and difficulty finding a parking space were what finally persuaded mother that I was right about moving. That and all the dents on the car caused by idiots.

Having said which, I scraped a car in the car park here recently. First accident for nearly forty years. I was not happy with myself, but at least the people were decent and I am paying for the damage. Mine has plastic corners so not worth repairing really.

Modern cars are much more reliable and economical but there are just so many of them - in most places, here we still tend to think of three cars and a combine harvester as a traffic jam.

Driving ughhhh, I spend a lot of my day driving from place to place, most days include the M25 or a complicated route to avoid it, traffic is awful now it's a waste of life, it takes me 25 minutes to get to work at 6am and 90 minutes to get home at 6pm

chris c wrote:Reported in Surrey where we used to live, someone went into the McDonalds for breakfast. drove out and went to work, and went back for dinner on the way home.

They were hit with a fine for being in the car park all day.

The endless traffic jams and difficulty finding a parking space were what finally persuaded mother that I was right about moving. That and all the dents on the car caused by idiots.

Having said which, I scraped a car in the car park here recently. First accident for nearly forty years. I was not happy with myself, but at least the people were decent and I am paying for the damage. Mine has plastic corners so not worth repairing really.

Modern cars are much more reliable and economical but there are just so many of them - in most places, here we still tend to think of three cars and a combine harvester as a traffic jam.

Sorry about the scraped car Chris ...

Modern cars are more reliable and safer, but so many on the roads.
Of course so many are now two, three, four car families. As soon as the kids are old enough they want to learn to drive, whereas when I was a child it was almost unheard of for women to drive let alone teenagers start thinking about it ...

All the best Jan

Andy12345 wrote:Driving ughhhh, I spend a lot of my day driving from place to place, most days include the M25 or a complicated route to avoid it, traffic is awful now it's a waste of life, it takes me 25 minutes to get to work at 6am and 90 minutes to get home at 6pm

Yes Andy, it does seem a waste of time or life but it's necessary, unless you can be one of the lucky few and work from home.

A friend was complaining recently about his journey to work, he says he has to leave no later than 5.45am and often doesn't get back home until after 7.30pm ... it's not easy, and of course if you have very young kids you just don't get to see them week-days.

Travel for most is a necessity, and I guess we just have to factor in extra time and do our best to grin and bear it ... is there another answer?

All the best Jan

I used to "reverse commute" when I lived in Ealing and worked in Dorking. At least most of the time I was going the opposite direction to most of the traffic, but gridlocks were not uncommon in West London, and even Dorking and similar towns when the M25 was blocked and all the traffic was diverted onto the "old roads".

I just remembered a couple of other horror stories. One was a farmer who got a speeding ticket on the M6 - for his combine harvester. The other was someone who was hit with a London congestion charge fine for a van that was in his yard, on blocks without an engine, because he was rebuilding it.

Obviously cloned plates.