5 June (Part 1) - You don’t often see…
…yellow lines being removed in Bexley but yesterday it happened. The area
around Alsike Road in Thamesmead and Fendyke Road in Belvedere was subjected to
a very noisy and smelly burning off operation.
The lines were installed more than three years ago to allow unimpeded access to
Crossrail storage sites. Whether they were ever legal is doubtful because there
were no restriction warning signs but they proved effective and deprived the
residents of Fendyke Road of two parking bays and a long length of single yellow line which
was converted to double.
In Alsike Road commuters lost 100 metres or so of free parking space.
Network Rail
finished their work East of Abbey Wood
station last August and the need for parking restrictions evaporated. Residents
asked for the ‘temporary’ parking restrictions to be removed
but to no avail.
But yesterday they were.
Nine or ten months after it could have been done and more than six months after
the Neighbourhood Watch coordinator made his request, Bexley Council limped into
action. There was no good reason for inconveniencing residents for longer than
necessary but it is what Bexley Council does.
Whether anyone was fined for parking at the far end of Fendyke Road is unknown.
I hope not. The yellow lines have no end markers and the nearest warning sign is
200 strides away beyond the junction with Fossington Road.