Lines and signs

One of the chief complaints from us when going about our nefarious (To some) errands is about the quality of road markings. Despite posting and reporting poor or almost erased lines and signs, these rarely seem to get done. For example, I was called to the Parking office a short while ago about two tickets I’d issued on single yellows. At the time of booking I’d phoned in to the appeals office and informed them about the parlous state of the markings. When I made the call I’d been roundly admonished and told to book the two vehicles in question under an ’01 No Waiting’ despite my better (I think) judgement.

“Hello Bill.” Kerry motioned me to sit down. “Just want to talk through a couple of things with you.” Hello, this sounds ominous.
“Sure, what’s up?”
“Those single yellow lines down the one side of Forward Street.” Uh-huh.
“Yeah, booked a couple of vehicles there a couple of weeks ago. What about it?” Of course I knew what was coming.
“Appeals office has cancelled the tickets.” What a waste of time that call was.
“I’m not surprised.” I shrugged.
“Yes well. This rather falls below the standard of work we’ve come to expect from you Bill.” Well thanks a bunch.
“I did call in to say I wasn’t happy booking on those markings, but the office told me to book anyway. The plates are dirty and the lines are so badly faded they’re unenforceable.” I complained.
“Bill, you know you’re supposed to report faulty markings.” Bloody hell-fire!
“Kerry, I swear to God I reported them last year and again six months ago, not to mention last week. Check the sheets. You can even check my old pocket note books. Everything gets reported, you know that.” I opened my pocket notebook and found the relevant entry, pointing it out to Kerry.
“Well the Projects department say no one told them.” They couldn’t find their own arses without a sodding map.
“Kerry, I’m not the only one, we keep on reporting these things but nothing seems to get done.”
“All right Bill, but be more careful in future.” I can’t help it if I’m ordered to book on unsafe markings. Why take it out on me for pity’s sake?

It’s not the first time I’ve had these discussions and I’m not the only one. One of the hot mess room topics is always ‘When are they going to do these bloody markings?’ How the rumours do fly. Sometimes, but only sometimes the markings do get done, much to the obvious triumph of our managers, who seem to have a hell of a job persuading ‘Projects’ to get them painted.

If it’s tough for us to make a judgement call on whether something’s enforceable, how are the public supposed to know?