Free Traffic Legal Advice

You don't respond, as in argue, their points at this stage, wait for the NTO*.

What you can usefully do is to write to them, say you will be making formal representations and therefore will await the NTO. However, in order to examine the authority's claims made in their letter you request that they provide you with the following:

A copy of the Traffic Management Order which creates the parking places in Old Rectory Gardens;
A copy of the council resolution which disapplies the provisions of the s.15 of the GLC(General Powers) Act 1974 and substitutes modified parking conditions.

You would need both of the above prior to receiving a NTO in order to be able to compile representations in time.


*- are you the registered keeper and are your DVLA details current?

This is what by default makes parking on pavements in London unlawful:

https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukla/1974/24/contents

This is probably the oldest extant legislation which applies in parking.

S15(1) creates the prohibition and s15(4) allows councils to disapply it in all or part of their area. 15(5) requires councils to place 'traffic signs' to mark the extent of any permitted area(signs aren't needed for the prohibition itself because it's statutory and you're expected to know). 'Traffic sign(s)' is a defined term, in this case signs in the Traffic Signs and General Directions Regs 2016. They have chosen the words 'Park in marked bays only'. This is not a permitted variant which is 'In marked bays'.
The regs do NOT have road markings for such bays.
All the council have is a couple of parking places whose presence is pursuant to a different statute and whose markings cannot be 'marked bays' for the purposes of footway parking.
Each parking place must be signed correctly. Theirs are not.

Regular unknowns:
Has the council even bothered to use s15(4 (known as passing a resolution)?
If so, to what extent?
Are the signs simply placed on convenient posts or do they actually mark the extent of permitted parking?
Why, if the short area between the signpost and the parking place is not a permitted area, did the council not place the sign at the parking place?
etc...
Are the parking places actually permitted to be partly on the footway?

All of which is grist to your representations mill and contained within the resolution(if such exists) and the Traffic Management Order which authorises the parking places. Hence why you're asking for them.

Happy new year all.  Onward fighting the b***ards that want to relieve us from our money!

Received a reply from Barnet this morning.  They have ignored my requests.  So I presume I will just ask again once I have received the NtO.


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(despite the invalid message, it seems to work!)

Send your request to foi@Barnet.gov.uk

For info and to keep the OP on track, this all new to them, and to emphasise the distinction which lies at the heart of their case, parking on the footway when 'reasonably necessary' is a statutory exemption from the Act which the OP is alleged to have contravened(GLC Gen Powers 1974) when this involves 'statutory undertakers' of which the Royal Mail in one. Now't to do with TMOs

Well done. We don't often see these !