Student drivers are unlikely to find the local authority a soft touch when it comes to parking fines, in spite of pleas for leniency from an empathetic councillor.
In fact, hapless students could be in for treble the trouble in the new year, according to Carlow town manager Joe Watters, with an additional two parking wardens to be introduced in the town.
Cllr Jim Townsend suggested that the council was against students and was targeting the weakest section of society by issuing parking tickets to students illegally parked outside IT Carlow.
“Where can they park if there’s no parking area? It’s not right,” he said.
Cllr Townsend said he was concerned that one student he knew was issued a parking ticket and was given 28 days to pay a €40 fine, or risk it being increased to €60. If in turn that wasn’t paid within 28 days, the student faced prosecution.
“The area by the bottle bank outside the regional college is a very wide stretch of road and there are lanes there for cycling but I saw no-one cycling on them. You could park 50 or 60 cars up there,” he suggested.
But Cllr Rody Kelly immediately dismissed the suggestion that students who drove cars came from the weakest section of society and said they were subject to the same laws as everyone else.
“Whoever has a car must obey the same law as anybody else,” he said.
“It is the traffic wardens’ duty to lay down the law and why should we pander to students more than anybody else?”
Cllr Ann Ahern said student parking was the responsibility of IT Carlow authorities.
“They are shirking there responsiblities to students, all these cars need somewhere to park,” she offered.
Cllr Michael Abbey pointed out that 40 acres of land on the Kilkenny Road had been zoned for parking for the college but the college didn’t have the money to pay for the parking facilities.
But he said there were also a large number of students living close by who drove their cars to the college every day, adding to the parking problem.
“We should say to the students living locally that the 100 or 200 yards to the college in the morning wouldn’t do them any harm,” he said.
Mr Watters said the council would continue to penalise anyone who parked illegally in the town.
“The council adopts by-laws and I would hope the staff will continue to implement them. Illegal parking causes more trouble than the inconvenience caused by tickets.
“Next year three traffic wardens will be implementing the laws,” he warned.
“If someone comes in to you will you be sympathetic?” asked Cllr Townsend.
“If they pay the money, yes,” Mr Watters replied.
He also said that any suggestion the council should dispense of cycle lanes in the area to accommodate student parking would be ‘very regressive’ in the scheme of what the council were trying to achieve.
