Parking in St Julian's

Although the St Julian's time-zone parking scheme has been operating for quite a while now, one cannot help wondering what criteria this selfish, and arguably illegal, scheme operates.

For the benefit of those who still do not know, most, if not all, of St Julian's public parking space was turned into timed by parking zones for non-residents.

It is not difficult to realise the negative repercussions that would ensue if all localities had to adopt such a scheme - Swieqi, Sliema, Guardamangia, Hamrun, Msida and a good number of other localities have parking problems at par with those of St Julian's.

What if they all followed its example? Moreover, one also asks where St Julian's residents park their cars when they leave their locality - where do they park for hours on end when they are at work, when they visit friends and relatives, go out on a Sunday or go the beach in summer? Chances are next to other people's residences and property.

Fundamentally, it has to be pointed out that St Julian's does not belong to its residents or to its local council - it belongs to all Maltese citizens and it is thus attended to by taxes paid by citizens from all localities. If St Julian's residents want 'exclusivity schemes' such as this one, they should start paying council tax or alternatively, in this particular case, induce the genius who came up with the idea to fork out his own money to attend to the roads.

In the light of all this, one can only hope for good sense and logic to prevail so that this scheme be removed because of the injustice it causes in itself and also because of the dangerous precedent it might give rise to.