Cycling in Waterloo Region

[danbrotherston]

I realize you are a former MLEO, but I really must disagree with this. Some, I feel is completely false, some, I think is just biased by the image.

The sidewalk was blocked, but not 50% but almost 2 feet (it's a wide sidewalk).

Unless you can point me to a specific bylaw which says parking less than 50% of the sidewalk is acceptable unless someone is observed to struggle to get by, I'm going to call bullshit. Courts make judgement based on the law, and the law says "don't block the sidewalk", not "mostly don't block the sidewalk".  If a court has made an error in legal judgement in your experience, I can believe that....they're just as failable as the rest of the justice system, but that is not a court policy, if it is, we need a protest.

But I don't think we do, I have a friend who has personally received a ticket for blocking a sidewalk when they were only 6 inches over, he measured, because he was angry, I was there in person, to see. This sidewalk was, for the record, several feet wide. He was blocking the sidewalk by less than even I would call in to complain about, and I am an asshole who calls and complains any time the sidewalk is blocked and I am inconvenienced.

As for the yellow space, you have simply chosen a line to draw around the SUV...that line is not perpendicular to the face of the building, by that logic, I can park anywhere next to a parking zone because I can just draw the lines however I want. That SUV was very clearly parked to the right of that sign, they are simply at an angle. Parking at an angle makes you an asshole, not a legal parker.

Part of this is the angle of the photo distorts things, the sign is only 2 meters from the sidewalk, it would be impossible to park any vehicle between the sign and the sidewalk, it is not intended to be a parking space, the signage is incompetent.

Third, as I already said, the use of "private property" on the signage is incorrect, that is not private property, there is no private property. I checked the city's property map before making this claim, I did not post a screenshot as I am out of image storage space, but I do not make claims like that lightly.

Edit: I see that you have drawn the yellow line along the line in the concrete, that is simply a decorative line, it doesn't actually mean anything if you see the entire square in context.

OK, so lets say you park a car on the roadway.  I will assume no one here has measured the space from their tire to the curb.  There is a by-law (in almost every city), park more than 15 cm from the curb.  If you are 45 cm from the curb, this is the part of the act you would be charged with.  Now lets say an MLEO lays a ticket for every car > 15.1 cm from the curb.  What do you think to Justice of the Peace would do with all of them?  Common sense applies, and JP's err to a greater degree.  (Kitchener) has lost enough parking trials with < 50% of the sidewalk blocked that the policy is to not write tickets.  I never said it was a court order, I said it was policy.  There are lots of policy decisions that you may not like, but they are there for a reason.  Could they continue and hope to get new precedence?  Perhaps... but there are lots of other violators to deal with. (Only exception to less than 50% would be if one or more tires were physically on the sidewalk).  The 50% rule applies to No Parking / No Stopping zones too.  [Unless spots are marked, then you would get a "Parked in more than one space" or "Parked in spot other than marked".  ANY blockage of a disabled space will warrant a ticket as there is an expectancy of a person needing the entire widened space.  Call bullshit all you want, its a fact of life.

As you are aware, I didn't take the picture.  I can also clarify I wasn't there to see this vehicle.  I stick by the yellow line at the sidewalk, but now that you have accused me of just drawing a line around the SUV, I will concede that the angles of the concrete that are parallel to the sidewalk are not the same as the line in the concrete to the right of the vehicle.  It is highly likely that the yellow line to the right should of gone below the vehicle.  I will also ASSUME that the bottom of the picture is the sidewalk along Charles, and if so, my yellow lines should of been cut short of that.

I'm not justifying the driver, nor am I saying you are wrong.  All I am doing is giving some insight when you accuse by-law of being unwilling to write a ticket since there is no arrow pointing that way.  There may be a reason to be unwilling.

Coke

You're basically arguing that the law is just "whatever man". The reason the law says 15 cm, is because 15 cm is too much. The law is there so that we all have, as much as is possible, an unambiguous statement about what is right and wrong. When it says 15 cm...it's because we all agree that it should be 15 cm, not 15.1 and not 14.9. Since that kind of thing can be measured unambigously, why should we not ticket 16 cm (lets be fair and use a reasonable measurement error)? I am sick and tired of people believing themselves above the law. The only thing worse than people believing themselves above the law is LEOs telling them that they are right.

As for why I believe this is okay, you're right, I don't measure the distance to the curb, but I know that farther than 15 cm (about half a foot) is not okay, which means when I park, I ensure that I'm closer than that...it isn't hard...I don't need a measuring tape, if I'm at all close to half a foot, I'm not close enough.

This is why I like automated enforcement. If there is a speed camera, if you are traveling over the set point for speeding (which *SHOULD* be the limit, but in practice will not be, but should at least be public), you get a ticket, no discussion, no "well, he's a white guy", "she's a cute girl", "he looks like me", "well he has kids at my school", they just get a ticket. And people who get angry about this do so because they are used to using their privilege to get away with breaking the law.

Like I said, I call your 50% of the sidewalk, as bullshit...sidewalks are of different width, and my stroller takes up more than 50% of the sidewalk, 50% is well beyond obstructing the sidewalk, most sidewalks are only 1.5 meters wide, that leaves .8 meters with no ticket issued? I can't get a stroller past that. When I call in a vehicle because I was forced to go off the edge of the sidewalk when walking, I expect a ticket to be issued, and I would be quite angry to find out that wasn't happening. We already bend over backwards to excuse driver behaviour at every turn...I expect bylaw to do their job and enforce the bylaws. My friend got ticketed for being a few inches over, but you're telling me a driver forcing me into mud won't be unless they are blocking more than half the sidewalk fuck that.

Now you may be right and they don't issue tickets. But you say this policy exists for a reason? This isn't a good reason, it's a very bad reason, they exist because we refuse to enforce our laws against people who break them, who fit a certain description (is driving a car), and that is very wrong. It's also a terrible implementation. The law is written down so that we can all see it, but if the law isn't being enforced, but some other secret policy is, that's not how a fair society works.

Look I'm basically just ranting at this point, but I'm sick and tired of this bullshit. I'm sick and tired of blocked sidewalks and I'm so fucking sick and tired of council telling me enforcement is the solution, then refusing to even enforce the bylaws...GAH!!!

As for whether bylaw would write a ticket, I don't know, I agree the sign is wrong, and whoever put it up is at fault for any failure to write a ticket.

While I'm in a ranting mood, I would like to point out the insanity that it took us YEARS, like 4-5 YEARS to get the city to properly sign the MUT along Weber St. as a MUT. I'm aware that people were harrassed BY POLICE who mistakenly believed it was a sidewalk, as a result of the incorrect signage. Yet I'm aware of two cases in a season we have signage put up by the city or region that is fundamentally flawed, first, the dismount signs at the IHT crossing, and now this sign. How come this is so hard.