Skip to main content

Parking problems in Bristol

It seems that people will park in the smallest of places, despite the efforts of urban street designers and town planners to ensure an orderly arrangement of suitably spaced cars. The advent of smaller-than-small cars has meant that drivers will park in smaller-and-smaller spaces. Surely some spaces are just too small to attract drivers of even the smallest car. But the city of Bristol, in southwest England, has taken no chances and has painted the double-yellow ‘no parking’ lines in areas where no one in t
August 21, 2015 Read time: 2 mins
It seems that people will park in the smallest of places, despite the efforts of urban street designers and town planners to ensure an orderly arrangement of suitably spaced cars. The advent of smaller-than-small cars has meant that drivers will park in smaller-and-smaller spaces. Surely some spaces are just too small to attract drivers of even the smallest car. But the city of Bristol, in southwest England, has taken no chances and has painted the double-yellow ‘no parking’ lines in areas where no one in their right mind could squeeze a car. Bristol City Council said the lines were there to ensure that vehicles did not park unsafely. However, people have been laughing at the short length of the lines. Because it is a space long enough for only a model car, why bother marking it out? One man who is against the parking zone tweeted a picture of a toy racing car beside the short yellow double lines, which he criticised as “completely over the top". "It would be virtually impossible to park anything in the space - it's even too small for a Smart car,” he reportedly said. “It's really ludicrous and so bureaucratic and just another foul-up from the council." A Bristol City Council spokeswoman said the lines ensure access for emergency services, as well as sanitation and delivery trucks, and allow residents enough space to get in and out of their driveways and garages.

Related Content

  • Highways England and Keir trial warning airbag
    May 3, 2021
    “Home Safe and Well”* is not just an inflated phrase put out by Highways England to raise awareness of work zone dangers
  • No parking here
    August 15, 2013
    In the UK, double yellow lines painted close at the kerbside denote an area where parking is not allowed. But in the city of Cambridge the authorities have decided to paint double yellow lines just 307mm long in between two parking bays. The space is barely large enough to park a radio-controlled car or to slot in a bicycle, let alone a motor vehicle, but the city’s authorities have nevertheless decided that it is important to denote the area is not to be used. Quite why it was felt necessary to take the ti
  • Riding the sustainable cycle
    October 5, 2020
    It’s taken a while in North America, but “vehicular cycling” has been replaced by “sustainable cycling”, says transportation engineer Tyler Golly.
  • Safer with sharrows?
    September 30, 2020
    Do bike lanes make cyclists safer? Yes and no, says John Anderson, director of technology at Smart Design*