|
|
 |
| |
Cabbie Alan Fleming: ‘We’re getting hit all
the time for no reason’ |
Cabbies' protest aims to cause traffic chaos
Drivers will circle Town Hall in parking
tickets demo
TAXI drivers are planning to lay siege to the Town Hall and
create gridlock on roads around King’s Cross in a protest
over parking fines.
Members of the 1,000-strong London Cab Drivers Club – which
represents black taxis – say Camden is the worst borough
in London for unnecessary parking tickets.
Chairman Alan Fleming hopes the 300 cabs which will circle the
Town Hall at lunchtime on Wednesday, April 13, will bring Euston
Road to a standstill.
He said: “They seem to be going for cabbies. We get fines
we shouldn’t have and it wears you down.”
Mr Fleming, 67, who lives in Fortune Green, added: “We
are going to form a wagon train and we’ll circle the Town
Hall to show them they have to take our views seriously.”
A cabbie for 35 years, he believes roadside cameras - there
are 105 in the borough – result in unfair fines for taxi
drivers. He said that taxis were allowed to stop to pick up
and drop off on red routes, but drivers still got fines for
doing so.
He added: “My colleagues are constantly getting whacked
with fines for £100 – and it is so much bother to
overturn them that many just end up shrugging their shoulders
and paying up.”
Mr Fleming added that cameras allowed no leeway for cabbies,
whose long shifts meant they were monitored constantly and minor
mistakes spotted.
He said: “If you put so much as half a wheel over a yellow
junction box, you get hit with a ticket.”
Cab drivers say the worst spots for tickets are the stretch
of Euston Road outside King’s Cross railway station, a
junction box at the corner of High Holborn and Kingsway, and
the nearby junction of Southampton Road and Theobalds Road.
And their protest has been backed by the London Motorists Action
Group, which was set up by Hampstead actor Tom Conti and Kentish
Town businessman Nick Marvides, who runs Ace Sports.
Mr Marvides said: “I think his plans are spot on. This
just shows all sorts of people are being hit by these ridiculous
traffic fines.”
A council press official said: “As we are a busy central
London borough with a large number of cabs using our roads each
day, there will naturally be more tickets issued to black cabs
than in some other boroughs.
“Taxis are subject to exactly the same parking and traffic
rules and regulations as any other vehicles are.” |
|
|
|
