Beware - changes in parking regulations in University Area

almillar

dmxdave - It started with parking issues, and we're still talking about the cost of motoring in general, and where the money goes. The thread's gone off on a bit of a tangent, but I've seen much worse! I'm still trying to save people money on their parking whilst Tara wants all cars out of Belfast (joking!).
Anyway:
Tara's points in post #54:
1. Yes, I agree with your stats. But the point I made, is that's an issue of driving standards, not the number of cars. I've banged on for years that making the driving test more difficult would solve lots of problems:
Fewer people will pass, or the people that are driving, will be better at it.
This means fewer cars on the road, and the ones that are, will be driven better. Less pollution, less traffic, more PARKING available.
2. I did give one reason. Another - I think the government likes to have the control and statistics they can get from the VED system. And I'll repeat that we all do PAYG motoring, since every litre of fuel we buy is mostly tax. Can't we get the bad drivers off the road instead of the poor ones?
3. I've no idea on figures I'm afraid. You think the road network is subsidised by other taxes, I think that all motoring related taxes combined (as above) more than pay for pure road issues, as well as subsidising the costs of treatment of patients from road accidents etc. Neither of us have stats though.
I don't think there should be residents only parking in the Holylands - just to bring the thread right back on topic!

tara747

almillar wrote: »

dmxdave - It started with parking issues, and we're still talking about the cost of motoring in general, and where the money goes. The thread's gone off on a bit of a tangent, but I've seen much worse! I'm still trying to save people money on their parking whilst Tara wants all cars out of Belfast (joking!).
Anyway:
Tara's points in post #54:
1. Yes, I agree with your stats. But the point I made, is that's an issue of driving standards, not the number of cars. I've banged on for years that making the driving test more difficult would solve lots of problems:
Fewer people will pass, or the people that are driving, will be better at it.
This means fewer cars on the road, and the ones that are, will be driven better. Less pollution, less traffic, more PARKING available.
2. I did give one reason. Another - I think the government likes to have the control and statistics they can get from the VED system. And I'll repeat that we all do PAYG motoring, since every litre of fuel we buy is mostly tax. Can't we get the bad drivers off the road instead of the poor ones?
3. I've no idea on figures I'm afraid. You think the road network is subsidised by other taxes, I think that all motoring related taxes combined (as above) more than pay for pure road issues, as well as subsidising the costs of treatment of patients from road accidents etc. Neither of us have stats though.
I don't think there should be residents only parking in the Holylands - just to bring the thread right back on topic!

Thanks for the reply, some food for thought there.

1.
I agree that the driving test should be harder. Driving is a privilege, not a right, but that seems to have been forgotten somewhere along the way.

I think that penalties for dangerous driving (especially causing death or serious injury) should reflect the seriousness of the consequences. Check out this case, in which a lorry driver got a pathetic 6-month suspended sentence for hitting (and killing) a cyclist, even after admitting that he had seen him. On top of that, he was only banned from driving for 2.5 years!!

http://road.cc/content/news/111362-suspended-sentence-lorry-driver-who-killed-cyclist-and-claimed-he-was-unable

2.
I don't have strong views on this, since I don't pay VED. But it seems crazy to spend a fortune administering this tax when there's an easier way to do it.

Re your 'poor drivers' point. Unfortunately, driving is expensive, but the cost to the environment needs to be taken into account as well. With the UK being taken to court by the EU over nitrogen dioxide levels (mainly from diesel cars), we are clearly causing a great deal of harm to our environment. Which is why I'd like to see a reduction in short car journeys.

3.
I agree 100%. If your house doesn't have a driveway, you must park where you can. Nobody owns the public road outside their house (although try telling that to the morons in the Markets who put cones outside their doors and scratch any unknown car that ends up parked there... what do the police do about these cones???).

tara747

warmhands.coldheart wrote: »

Funny, I was speaking to someone who had been at a "consultation" about residents parking and that's exactly the issue that came up. One, lets say larger lady, was giving off that her Daughter, who lived 4 streets away but outside the proposed area, should get a residents permit as she was at her house nearly every day......... As you say, heaven forbid she should have to walk a couple of hundred yards

:rotfl:

Was this the Holylands consultation?

Surely if she's at home all day, she doesn't need a car. Or does she need reserved parking for her 'visitors'? :cool:

almillar

Unfortunately, driving is expensive

Not before tax it's no - it's artificially expensive.
What industry has done more to become environmentally friendly than the car industry? I think it's unfair to blame so much pollution on cars, when so much of it comes from elsewhere - old lorries, buses, trains, ships, aeroplanes - and that's just transport!
Nitrogen dioxide is diesel's dirty little secret. There's no soot from new diesel cars (there is, but it gets shoved into a box in the exhaust and burnt, how high tech!) so people think they're so clean.
There was something about some Saab, 20 years ago, someone drove through London, and the quality of the air coming out the exhaust was better than that at the front of the car! Lots of pollution is coming from other places I think... Possibly all that coal we burn to run electric cars.
Parking outside your house - if I see cones, I won't move them, they've got no entitlement to do it, but I give them the benefit of the doubt that there's an elderly person with a nurse visiting or something. If they've a genuine reason, they should leave a note on cars instead of damage them.

tara747

almillar wrote: »

Not before tax it's no - it's artificially expensive.
What industry has done more to become environmentally friendly than the car industry? I think it's unfair to blame so much pollution on cars, when so much of it comes from elsewhere - old lorries, buses, trains, ships, aeroplanes - and that's just transport!
Nitrogen dioxide is diesel's dirty little secret. There's no soot from new diesel cars (there is, but it gets shoved into a box in the exhaust and burnt, how high tech!) so people think they're so clean.
There was something about some Saab, 20 years ago, someone drove through London, and the quality of the air coming out the exhaust was better than that at the front of the car! Lots of pollution is coming from other places I think... Possibly all that coal we burn to run electric cars.
Parking outside your house - if I see cones, I won't move them, they've got no entitlement to do it, but I give them the benefit of the doubt that there's an elderly person with a nurse visiting or something. If they've a genuine reason, they should leave a note on cars instead of damage them.

My point was more about the cost to the environment rather than in pounds and pence. Which is why motoring-related taxes are needed, IMHO. We can't continue polluting the atmosphere the way we have been over the last few decades. Obviously there are many culprits, not only cars.

I take your point about other forms of transport, they all contribute to pollution.

As for 'What industry has done more to become environmentally friendly than the car industry?': to be honest, it's been forced upon them either by legislation or by commercial interest (cars that attract higher VED/are less efficient may suffer a drop in sales). Car companies haven't made improvements out of the goodness of their hearts. :cool: And they are still manufacturing mid-life crisis cars with enormous engines...

Re the cones - yes, perhaps they're having elderly visitors or a nurse calling round, but every day??? Also, the scratched cars give them away. :rotfl:

warmhands.coldheart

tara747 wrote: »

:rotfl:

Was this the Holylands consultation?

Surely if she's at home all day, she doesn't need a car. Or does she need reserved parking for her 'visitors'? :cool:

No Comment !!

belfastgirl23

The cones thing is an issue as well for people like me who use them maybe twice a year when expecting a big delivery etc. It took four weeks for us to get the tree outside our house cut back because every time the tree surgeons turned up they couldn't work at it because of the cars parked underneath and the idiots who had moved the cones so they could park. I was tempted to say, just go for it, that's another way of going about scratching cars lol! Seriously though, I don't resent anyone parking outside my door (occasionally a very nice country person will apologise lol!) but it does hack me off that if you need access once in a blue moon people don't respect it.

almillar

Yes, I was talking about the cost to the environment too. I still can't think of an industry that's done better. Of course it's not being done out of the goodness of the manufacturers' hearts (do they have hearts?) but it's being done anyway.
Even the so called mid-life crisis cars have massively reduced their CO2 emmissions. I've got a 170bhp car (not mid-life crisis) that costs £160 per year to tax. Indeed it could be argued that a lot of sports cars are actually working harder than small cars to get stacks of power from very little emmisions. And at the very top end, the latest Ferrari and McLaren supercars, or rather hypercars, are actually hybrids!
I really hope you don't want to ban fast cars, I love to look at them and dream... They should be taxed more than other cars. but £460 is the top tax bracket. Cars built in 2006 are being charged that, and they're worth £5k. They're going to the scrap heap faster, because of the high tax on them relative to other costs. Is scrapping (already more fuel efficient than before) cars really environmentally friendly?
The bee in my bonnet, in a nutshell is the poor value for money motorists get.
belfastgirl - I'd never move cones as I think I said. A bit of responsible use, like yourself, all round would go along way, but there I go dreaming again...

Witless

http://www.u.tv/News/Drivers-eye-injured-in-cyclist-attack/c65bc2a3-f061-4d13-804a-8a6c7912765e