Bus lanes make money

HAVING come a cropper with two bus lane fines on Oxford Road recently, I am more than unsurprised to see that it has been revealed as one of the country’s revenue-generating hotspots. And that is exactly what it is, revenue generation.

The council asserts that its signage is adequate. This must be in one of those weird parallel universes, where Brexit is full of sunshine and unicorns.

It is not well-signed, either on Oxford Road or on the many side roads leading on to it.

I turned from Grafton Street onto Oxford Road with no indication that I would be in a bus lane a few hundred yards down the track. Once onto Oxford Road, there is no way out.

I appealed directly to the council regarding these fines and got a standard reply: “The council does not accept that any of the grounds or other grounds for representation have been established.”

Apparently, inadequate signage does not meet the grounds to cancel a fine with them. And yet it does with the independent adjudicator.

The item that really gets one’s goat though is the line: “As you enter the bus gate there are signs to indicate the start of the bus gate and an alternative route should have been taken.”

Is the council wilfully obtuse or are they just plain trying to be offensive? If the signs are at the start of the bus lane, and not before, they are of use to no one.

Despite having already paid my fines, I look forward to appealing to the adjudicator.

Hopefully a lawyer will take up a class action case against the council too. I’m happy to contribute.