A Brighton trader was shocked to be fined twice for using new red route loading bays, even though he stayed no longer than 20 minutes.
Clark Maides of M and B Meats believes he has been penalised because he left the van unattended for up to six minutes between loads in the London Road loading bay.
But he says as the loading bay is 46 metres away from the shop, it can take a few minutes to unload trolleys and return.
Mr Maides says when they came into force in April, he was told he has up to 20 minutes to load and unload his vehicle and says he has never exceeded this time.
However, he did not expect the camera operators monitoring the loading bays to be timing the gaps between visits to the vehicle.
He said: “I wasn’t ever made aware that we had to be consistently loading every second
“Our shop isn’t near a loading bay so it takes time to get to and from.”
What frustrates Mr Maides is the company van is in the loading bay every morning six-days a week for loading deliveries and the operators should recognise it by now.
Brighton and Hove City Council said the fines were issued on Thursday 18 and Saturday 20 July – the first at 9.20am and second at 9.36am – as the van was in the loading bay for too long.
When asked by the Local Democracy Reporting Service a council spokesperson said the traffic regulation order (TRO) for the red routes does not limit the length of time someone can park while loading or unloading, as long as they are actively doing so.
Mr Maides, who runs the business with his father Graham, raised concerns about loading bay distances last year during the initial consultation into red routes after receiving a fine in August after the company’s van was parked on edge of a new bus stop outside the shop.
The bus stop was installed close to where there used to be a loading bay nearer the business outside Poundland.
After viewing the CCTV footage for the recent fines, Mr Maides believes the fine was issued due to inactivity.
He said: “I keep being told that the council want the red route to work for businesses, but while that’s a cute political statement and one they may even think to be true, in reality, it isn’t working for us.
“We and our suppliers are getting fines for taking too long to load customers also unable to load freely.
“I appreciate any effort that the council and the parking team have made to try to help but they haven’t exactly solved any of our issues.
“We’re at the end of our tether with it really, we’re just trying to run our business and finding more obstacles that we really could do without.”
Cabinet member for transport, parking and public realm councillor Trevor Muten said listening to residents and traders is an important part of the red route trial, and adaptations have already been made including extending and adding loading bays.
Councillor Muten said: “If vehicles are observed to be in a bay for an extended period of time but are not being loaded or unloaded, our team will take action.
“Fines can be appealed and information on how to do so is available on our website.
“We are keen to maintain positive relationships with all traders on London Road and ensure balanced outcomes for all and will happily review this fine if an appeal is lodged.
“Red routes are improving traffic flows, bus punctuality and air quality and reducing traffic congestion, making pedestrian and cycle access better and safer.
“We are determined to make red routes work well for everyone and, if necessary, will make further adaptions during the remainder of this six-month consultation to make this scheme a success.”
Other business owners in London Road have shared their concerns about the red route which is currently subject to public consultation until the end of September.
Smokemart owner Kamil Sharobi, 38, launched a petition on the council website calling for an end to the red routes in London Road and Lewes Road because of the impact on businesses and the community.
During London Road Local Action Team meetings, Mr Sharobi has told Councillor Muten how he struggled to deliver stock to his shop because of the lack of parking.
Richard Grills, 48, who owns the café/bar Presuming Ed, has also shared his issues with the lack of loading bays near his business.
In response to other businesses’ concerns, a six-metre-long loading bay was extended to 12 metres to accommodate lorries delivering to McDonalds and Taco Bell.
Business owners and residents affected by the red routes can submit feedback by emailing parkingprojects@brighton-hove.gov.uk before Monday 30 September.
Good old BHCC! Screwing every penny they can from the motorist and punishing local businesses.
The Transport department truly are the scum of the Earth.
Overdramatics aside, in this instance, I agree with you that BHCC were far too zealous in the issuing of this particular fine.
The police are the scum of the earth.
Not really true either. People claiming that ACAB usually have had a bad run-in with police, and usually through their misadventure, in my experience.
I would suspect this could be appealed quite easily, the onus would be on BHCC to prove inactivity during those allowed twenty minutes.
That is true however, the vast majority of appeals to BHCC are dismissed. This is not surprising given the clear conflict of interest.
From my own personal experience, the parking ombudsman are the only genuinely objective adjudicators as all of my appeals (previously rejected by the council)), were upheld.
Agreed, really good statistics showing appeals to the ombudsman tend to favour the driver. It might indicate that the council’s own appeal process is lacking.
Council’s own appeal process = marking their own homework
BHCC turning a Butcher’s into a BHCC vehicle fine appeal administration organisation.
20 minutes tops to fill out an appeal form.
The problem is, inactivity occurs while you are taking what you’ve unloaded from the van to the shop and unloading it at the shop, so technically there is no activity at the van which makes it hard to appeal.
Technically accurate, however, a concept in law that applies common sense to avoid absurdities is known as the “Golden Rule” of statutory interpretation. It is often employed to prevent an outcome that would be absurd or contradictory to the intention of the legislature, which, applied to this case, would be fining a driver for using the loading bay to unload.
With this consideration, and with the weighting that it was done within 20 minutes as per the signage, I believe they would have very strong grounds for appeal. It would also set the tone for any further attempts at fining other drivers for a similar situation. It absolutely shouldn’t have gotten to an appeal stage, and I think it would be really important that anyone successful in their appeal, talk to the journalists on here to highlight the ruling.
I’m genuinely a fan of the red routes but they should not be penalising the traders like this, the council need to ensure the traders are helped as much as possible, the high street is dying as it is.
I agree, particularly when this appears to be in the spirit of the intention of the loading bays, with no obvious malfeasance.
The traders should co-operate and have their deliveries by a single large lorry three times a week that pulls up and stops in the middle of the road. They can then pay a single fine between them and the chaos of a blocked street is then a problem for the council that they made for themselves.
If you want to screw things up, get the council to implement something.
Nah, really bad advice. Particularly since the driver would be the one who bears the brunt of all that, could even lead to a driving ban.
Regulating shops out of existence!
Brighton Council is the enemy of the sane.
More extortion from BHCC
This is what you get when you put people with zero experience or knowledge about running a business, in charge of everything over those that do.
How did you think that was going to work out?
We have to find another way of running local matters on behalf of the public and get rid of councils and council staff, because running the city by giving charity jobs to the weak-minded is ridiculous. Some council staff work just one day a week. Yes, it’s true. This is totally wasting our money. We need to scrap councils and find a new professional way to run local matters. The road patching is another fail making us bankrupt. This all has to stop.
Like…running an election of sorts, some sort of local election where the public chooses someone to direct local matters…a person to represent the various wards, so they can counsel the officers…some sort of…Ward Councillor?
The people in charge have demonstrated time and time again that they are simply not capable of undertaking even the most simple tasks. It’s not their fault they simply don’t have the level of intelligence or experience required to undertake these tasks.
They wouldn’t survive holding down a responsible position outside of their little protected bubble…….Total incompetence sums it up. My message to them is, Please step aside and leave it to someone who is capable at managing these matters 🙏
I am definitely a fan of the red routes. They didn’t learn their lesson parking on double yellow lines. Sometimes at the junction of Elm Grove cars would be parked all along the road up to the crossing. This was dangerous for pedestrians and also buses struggled to get through. The cycle lane was also blocked forcing cyclists out into the traffic. Family and friends including taxis parked up for a chat.
Just a small reminder it is also illegal to park on double yellow lines too so I don’t see the problem.
I think it unfair tho to fine people in loading bays when they have to leave the vehicle to offload the goods. I’m not a cyclist or anti car person as I’m also a driver. I just don’t like people who break the law and also cause safety issues for other people.
Last week a trader unloading his van down the side road was parked across 2 disabled bays because a small car was in the loading bay. So wrong in so many ways.
So what was the lorry supposed to do? He needed to unload. To a schedule. And some kid in a small car who nipped into the shops had illegally parked in the loading bay. The poor lorry driver was on a schedule.
The butcher trying to unload can’t just drive around hoping for a space. Surely anyone who does the ticket site can recognise the same van every day? What happened to common sense.
We all knows the shop keepers took the p*ss and parked all day… but it is easy to spot their Mercs are not delivery vans.
Don’t worry. Make all the real shops close down and replace with coffee shops…