Currently, the Highway Code rule 244 states:
"You MUST NOT park wholly or partially on the pavement in London and should not do so elsewhere unless signs permit it. Parking on the pavement can obstruct and seriously inconvenience pedestrians, people in wheelchairs or with visual impairments and people with prams or pushchairs"
The emphasis on "must not" there is repeated in the Highway Code and signifies that that ruling is supported by traffic law. You'll notice that it only applies to London, meaning that people who are not in London are not currently breaking the law if they park on pavements.
There is a separate law relating to generally obstructing pavements which is applied to badly parked cars and this is enforced by Police, with local councils having the task of enforcing specific parking rules such as parking on yellow lines during their period of operation or pay and resident only parking spaces.
The changes being discussed by MP's at the moment (well... when they get back to the task of conducting day to day business as usual) is whether to extend the total ban on pavement parking that exists in London to the rest of the UK and in doing so, whether to make local councils responsible for enforcing the rule.
Whilst this would be very popular amongst those most commonly affected by bad parking, I think that we should be careful what we wish for in that a lot of pavement parking is done for the purposes of allowing people to park near to their houses whilst keeping sufficient access for emergency vehicles.
As an example, the staff at Alsager Fire Station are often frustrated by vehicles parked badly in Brookhouse Road. This narrow road is lined with double yellow lines (so no waiting at any time although dropping off and picking up passengers is allowed) and I suspect that those responsible are probably using their rights as Blue Badge holders to ignore those lines whilst they visit local shops or the Church (Blue Badge holders can park on yellow lines, but only where it is otherwise safe and convenient for others for them to do so - in this case it is definitely not convenient).
Putting the Blue Badge and yellow lines issues aside for a moment, if the car is parked partially on the pavement, then it is a squeeze for vans etc to get past and pedestrians need to leave the pavement to pass it (there is grass there, so leaving the pavement is not usually a hassle for those on foot, but think those in wheelchairs etc and how appropriate this is if the grassed area gets muddy). If that same vehicle is parked with all 4 wheels on the road, then although access for pedestrians is now unaffected, there is no room for vans to pass and it becomes a squeeze for cars... THE FIRE ENGINES CAN'T GET DOWN THAT WAY EITHER WAY!
Now that's an inconvenience when it's applied to Brookhouse Road, but can you imagine what could happen if it becomes normal all over the UK? Whilst Brookhouse Road is clearly a particularly narrow road, if you think about the width of the road you probably live on, this could easily happen if pavement parking is banned without careful consideration. Not everywhere has the same wide roads that London has got and as such I reckon it would at least halve the amount of parking space available for 75% of the country's residential roads.
This all sounds very biased in favour of the driver, but I am not ignorant of the plight of pedestrian traffic on our pavements (if I may group those with disabilities together with the fully able-bodied and those with prams and pushchairs etc). It is a simple and reasonable ambition that a pedestrian shouldn't have to leave the pavement in order to go around a parked car but they have to do so far too often at the moment and therefore a solution to the problem must be found.
For me, the answer lies in more stringent enforcement of the current pavement obstruction laws and an increase in public awareness of the problem. If the powers of local councils could be enhanced to allow them to ticket vehicles parked on the pavement and not allowing enough room for either emergency vehicles or pedestrians then this could go a long way to help ease the problem. In the event of pavement parking being banned of course, this would need to be the case anyway to ensure compliance, so it seems a logical step really.
The consultation will run for 12 weeks and there is a recommendation by the Transport Committee that pavement parking is banned... it'll be interesting to see how it pans out!
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