There is is no traffic order establishing footway parking and no marked bays.
The sign is simply stuck on a post in an unrestricted street and is misleading because there is no sign pointing the other that bans footway parking to the right.
The area has widespread such footway parking and from our experience the council will have passed a resolution disapplying the London-wide footway/verge parking ban, and this is likely to apply to all parts of the road.
This case from a nearby road gives background but it is from 10 years ago.
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Case reference 2160356237
Appellant Daniel Gentry
Authority London Borough of Redbridge
VRM EN05KMJ
PCN Details
PCN AF75061949
Contravention date 11 Dec 2015
Contravention time 14:55:00
Contravention location Fairway Gardens
Penalty amount GBP 110.00
Contravention Footway parking
Referral date -
Decision Date 21 Sep 2016
Adjudicator Hugh Cooper
Appeal decision Appeal allowed
Direction cancel the Penalty Charge Notice and the Notice to Owner.
Reasons Mr Gentry appeared before me today for the personal hearing of his appeal. He gave evidence in the same terms as his earlier representations to the Enforcement Authority and his Notice of Appeal, adding further details to his account.
He does not dispute that his car was parked with two wheels on the footway in Fairway Gardens not far from its junction with Loxford Lane when this Penalty Charge Notice (PCN) was issued to it. He does not now dispute either that there was a sign on a lamp post in front of his car indicating that footway parking was permitted beyond that point. However he has challenged the Authority’s power to issue a PCN in these circumstances, on the basis of information which he saw on plans published on their own website.
Mr Gentry has repeatedly asked the Authority to produce copies of the resolution(s) which he argues were required under Section 15(4) of the Greater London Council (General Powers) Act 1974 (as amended) to authorise the exemption (and more particularly the extent of such exemptions at this location) from the London-wide ban on footway parking. Having first informed him that no such resolutions were required, and that they were entitled to simply rely on the signs, the Authority asserted in their Notice of Rejection that they had indeed “obtained the relevant resolutions to exempt roads from the Great London Councils footway ban". They have not, however, seen fit to produce any such resolutions for the appeal.By way of background, Mr Gentry explained that he had lived for 10 years at his parents’ house just round the corner from this location in Loxford Lane, and that for many years vehicles routinely parked on the full length of the footways in all the streets in the area, save for where there were double yellow lines on the corners. He acknowledged that on this occasion he had parked where he did for that reason, and accepted that he had not actually seen the footway parking sign on the lamp post at the time.
However he has produced the plans from the Authority’s website, which indicate that they relate to a review carried out in 2014 of footway parking provision in the area. As far as I can interpret them, the streets marked in blue were those subject to review. The Key appears to indicate that dotted black lines indicated the Existing lengths of street which were currently exempt from the ban. That dotted black line appears to include the part of Fairway Gardens where Mr Gentry’s car was parked when this PCN was issued to it.
It is apparent that the review proposed the **** of signs which were in fact in place at the location when the PCN was issued, but what is conspicuously lacking in the evidence before me is any resolution by the Authority which puts those changes (between existing and proposed exemptions) into effect.
Without that evidence, which Mr Gentry has clearly and repeatedly requested, I cannot be satisfied that the point in Fairway Gardens where he parked was not in fact, despite the positioning of the signs, still not subject to a footway parking exemption. Consequently I cannot be satisfied that the contravention alleged occurred.I must therefore allow this appeal.
I emphasised to Mr Gentry that I have not made a finding of fact that an exemption did apply at the material time. The appeal has been allowed simply because I cannot be satisfied that it did not. He should not therefore take this decision as implying that he can park at this location with impunity in the future.
