So the reform of the local enforcement system is afoot. This basically means that something is going to be done about the wardens. There’s a website with Schiaparelli pink boxes urging us to write in and have our say as to how this should be done. I’ve heard talk about renaming them and giving them an image overhaul – maybe even changing their uniforms.
The idea is to try and shift the perception of them from that of wannabe policemen lying in wait behind the bushes to pounce on unsuspecting motorists to something more benign.
Add to this, there’s the necessity of doing something about what they’re costing us, because they’re costing us a bomb. Although wardens are dishing out tickets for traffic offences (only a paltry one per cent of all tickets issued are for other types of offences), only a miniscule amount of the cash collected from fines finds its way into local council coffers. The lion’s share of the income from fines goes to the private companies administering the system. The remainder is shared out between the local councils equally, independently of size or population density.
So you could have a quiet little rural village receiving the same amount of funds as a much bigger, crowded city. Clearly there’s something very wrong with the whole system. The whole set-up is costly to run and has not given tangible results in terms of cleanliness of localities or improving the well-being of residents. All it has done is frustrate motorists and stymied businesses without contributing much to the transformation of the country into a more pleasant place to live in.
I’m all aboard with suggestions about reforming the warden system, especially if we shift to a system that is fairer. By fairer, I mean a system which penalises behaviour that can be avoided and not that which is simply the result of so many cack-handed decisions by the authorities.
As it is, practically the only contraventions being punished are parking offences. But it’s not as if the authorities have done anything to make it easier to find parking spaces or even to use public transport.
It’s not as if the authorities have done anything to make it easier to find parking spaces or even to use public transport
There have been a series of decisions that have resulted in our roads being clogged up by privately-owned cars. The Arriva debacle has been analysed at length. The upshot of that Austin Gatt/Manuel Delia project is well known.
If persuading people to board buses was difficult then, it’s even more of an uphill slog now. Result? More people using their private vehicles – all of which have to be parked somewhere.
Mepa have added to the mess by dishing out permits and ignoring all common sense rules. Businesses and developers who cannot provide the required parking facilities for new building projects are required to make a sizeable contribution to the commuted parking payment scheme.
To date, there are millions of euros of funds collected in this way lying around accumulating interest. Those funds should be used for the construction of car parks as well as for the provision of local public transport systems and infrastructure of ancillary facilities.
I don’t have updated figures but up to 2009, Mepa had spent only €941,077 of the €10.6 million collected for the development of public car parks and traffic facilities. At one point, Mepa used the CPPS funds to help finance the purchase of Hexagon House – which was good for Mepa, but not so good for the thousands of contributors to the fund who did not see any payback by way of parking provisions or facilities for their businesses or localities.
Residents and businesses are being triply penalised – first by an authority which gives out permits without due attention to the traffic impact of development, then by being made to contribute to a fund for parking spaces, and then by being fined for parking contraventions necessitated by the lack of parking spaces.
This kind of unfairness is going to be perpetuated if the wardens continue to be focused on traffic offences. They’d be more usefully employed in the role of green wardens ensuring that anti-littering rules are respected. After all, it only takes a minimal effort to dispose of dog dirt or not to take out cartons in the road. Certainly much less effort than that required to find a legal parking spot anywhere within a 10-block radius of one’s home.
cl.bon@nextgen.net.mt